The Y-Axis
by SmartyPants001
Summary: "This boy, he's…interesting. His aura seems to extend a bit into the future, then…shift?" Crossover between games and anime. Contains eventual BrightTomorrowShipping and Amourshipping. Smart(er)!Ash
1. A Journey Begins

**Author's Notes:**

 **Me: ... I'm sorry I haven't uploaded since March. Lower your pitchforks and torches, I have a reason**

 **Pinkie: You better!**

 **Me: WHAT THE- how did you get here?**

 **Pinkie: I'm Pinkie Pie, don't question it.**

 **Me: Anyway, I had exams throughout April and May that I had to study for, and I spent the summer with family.**

 **Pinkie: ...Okay...**

 **Me: And to attempt to make up for it, I'm going to try to maintain a weekly update schedule.**

 **Pinkie: That is acceptable**

 **Me: Yes and without further adieu, I-**

 **Pinkie: He doesn't own Pokemon or anything referenced in this story. He'll only say this once. On with the story!**

* * *

 _Chapter I: A Journey Begins_

Vaniville Town in southwestern Kalos was always a quiet area. The small town of barely five thousand residents never got too much tourist traffic, something the population appreciated. On one of the many sunny morning the town gets, a small red and white bird sat on a tree branch outside the first house on Flower Street. It chirped once before gliding down through the house's open window and perching on the shoulder of a tall brown-haired woman who appeared to be in her forties.

"Fletchling, could you wake up the twins?" She asked the bird.

If birds could smile, Fletchling would have smirked. The bird fluttered up the stairs to where the stairway split. Taking the left stair, it darted into the boy's room and quickly zeroed in on the sleeping boy. Fletchling dive-bombed him in the head, which got him up nearly instantly.

"OW!" Shouted the now wide-awake boy. "I'm going to get brain damage if you keep waking me up like this!"

The orange bird just giggled.

The boy let out a low growling sound before lunging at the bird, which, in his groggy state, was easily dodged, causing the boy to fall out of bed and land on his left arm. He held back a hiss of pain. "Yep, that's going to bruise," he looked up at the fletchling. "One day, Fletchling, I won't miss."

Fletchling took this as an empty threat and darted off to wake up the boy's twin sister. The boy grumbled and went downstairs, still in his pajamas.

"Calem!" The boy's mother yelled when he reached the first floor. "You look completely disheveled. Go back to your room and clean yourself up."

Calem, sighed and went back upstairs. When he came back down, the grey-eyed boy was in jeans and a T-shirt, and his brown hair was no longer a complete mess, or at least it was hidden by the red cap he was wearing. "So, what's for breakfast?" He asked.

"Bacon and eggs," Calem's mother responded with a smile. Calem smiled and walked over to the table, taking a seat.

Calem's sister slowly descended the stairwell while yawning. "Nice to see you up and about this early, Serena," Calem said sarcastically once she was off the stairwell.

Serena, a girl with grey eyes and wearing a red skirt with a black T-shirt just responded by sticking her tongue out at him. "Eggs?" She asked her mother, pushing her shoulder-length honey blonde hair out of her face as she spoke.

"Yes," she replied happily. Serena happily walked over and helped herself to a fried egg.

"Mom, these are great!" Calem exclaimed, shovelling eggs into his mouth.

Serena scrunched up her nose. "Could you at least not talk with your mouth full?"

Calem rolled his eyes, but swallowed what was in his mouth before taking another bite.

"Thank you Calem." She smiled. "Now, this is our third full day in Vaniville, and you two haven't made any new friends yet. I want you two to introduce yourselves to our neighbors after breakfast."

"Sure thing, mom," Serena replied.

"All right, I'm finished," Calem said, pushing his chair out and standing up.

Both mother and daughter looked at him surprised. "H-how?!" Exclaimed Serena in slight awe. "That was only a minute and a half!"

"I'm sixteen and excited to meet people," Calem deadpanned before dropping his dishes in the sink and rushing upstairs to grab his shoulder bag.

Serena looked down at her half-finished eggs. "The eggs were great mom, but-"

Her mother interrupted. "I know, you have to go to keep your brother in check."

"Thanks, mom!" She said before quickly excusing herself and rushing to her room to get her things.

Less than a minute later, both Serena and Calem arrived downstairs at about the same time. "Bye you two," called the mother as the two teens rushed out the door.

"Bye, mom!" They called back in unison.

Outside on the house's cobble driveway, the teens were greeted almost immediately by a green eyed, girl with brown hair done up in pigtails about their age wearing short shorts and a pink T-shirt, who was practically bouncing up and down with the excitement of meeting new people. "Hi!" She exclaimed enthusiastically. "My name is Shauna! I'm your new neighbor! What are your names?"

Calem blinked a few times before responding. "My name is Calem," he said. "And my twin sister over here is Serena."

"Hello," Serena said warmly.

"It's nice to meet you!" Shauna exclaimed, ever enthusiastically. "I have an idea! Why don't you come over to Aquacorde Town with me and you can meet my other friends!" She then ran off towards Route One.

Calem again blinked a few times and Serena lightly punched him in the arm. "She might just have more energy than you, Calem!"

Calem winced slightly at the contact with his bruised arm, but then smirked. "Challenge accepted."

Serena rolled her eyes at her brother's childish behavior. "Anyway," she said, "We should probably head for Aquacorde Town."

* * *

Coming off of route one five minutes later, Calem asked, "Why is that even labeled as a route? It's even paved!"

While Calem did bring up a good point, Serena's thoughts were interrupted by Shauna yelling, "Calem, Serena, over here!" As she waved to them from a table at a café with two other people.

Calem and Serena walked over to the table and sat down in two of the empty chairs. Shauna began introductions. "Calem, Serena, this is Tierno and Trevor. Tierno, Trevor, this is Calem and Serena."

Tierno was a portly boy with short black hair done up in small spikes in jeans and a black vanillish T-shirt. He was carrying a yellow backpack. Trevor, in contrast, was a lanky, younger boy with orange, almost spherical hair around his head, and was considerably better dressed than Tierno, wearing black jeans and a short-sleeve dress shirt. He also was carrying a green backpack and had a camera hanging around his neck.

"Hello, it's nice to meet you two," said Trevor.

"Hi!" Tierno exclaimed. "It's nice to see that Shauna has made some friends outside of our little group, even if she probably has the full intention of bringing you into our little group."

"Hey!" Shauna shouted, "I have friends outside this group!"

"Name one!" Tierno countered.

"Um, er, okay, yeah, you're right. You four are pretty much my only friends," Shauna conceded. "Anyway, Professor Sycamore wanted us to give you two your starter pokémon."

Calem and Serena gave each other a shocked look.. The professor knew about them? And he wanted to give them starter pokémon?

Trevor was rummaging around in his bag for the pokéballs. "Found them!" He exclaimed. He cleared his throat and continued on. "There's Chespin, the grass type starter," he threw a pokéball up in the air and the spiky nut pokémon popped out onto the table, striking a pose. "Fennekin, the fire type starter," he repeated the process with another pokéball and the fox pokémon entered the scene, yawning as if she had just woke. "And Froakie, the water type starter," Another pokéball was thrown and the bubble frog pokémon was on the table, puffing out his chest in pride. "Also, Shauna, since you don't have a pokémon yet, the professor said that you could pick one as well."

"Really?" Shauna asked, surprised.

"Yep," Tierno said, popping the 'P'. "Now, who's going to pick first?"

"I think I'll choose last, seeing as Calem and Serena are new here," Shauna explained.

Calem and Serena looked at each other. "You're younger," Calem said. "So I'll let you go first."

After a few moments of thinking, Serena nodded, "I'll pick Froakie."

The frog seemed elated to have a trainer. "Fro Froakie!" He exclaimed.

Calem nearly let out an audible sigh of relief. "All right then," He said. "I choose Fennekin."

"Fenn," she purred quietly, a smile on her face.

"I guess that leaves me with Chespin then!" Shauna exclaimed happily.

"Chespin ches!" He exclaimed in an equally enthusiastic way.

"Also," Trevor began. "Professor Sycamore asked me to give you three this." He handed them a square device with two glowing blue lines that met in the middle where there was a blue, glowing circle containing a pokéball design.

"What's this?" Calem asked.

"This is a pokédex, now updated to have information on all seven hundred twenty-one pokémon, excluding legendaries and mythicals; no one really encountered them enough." Trevor explained.

Calem and Serena gaped at this for different reasons. Serena because she was not expecting this, and Calem because the device in his hand had information on nearly seven hundred pokémon. Shauna just smiled at having one.

"Trevor," Serena started. "We can't accept this."

"Take it. The professor insists. We all insist," Trevor countered.

Tierno and Shauna nodded in agreement.

Serena sighed, feigning annoyance. "Fine."

"Oh! I almost forgot!" Tierno said suddenly. "The professor sent a letter for your mother." He handed Calem an envelope.

"All right," Calem took the envelope, putting it in his shoulder bag, "we'll give this to our mom, and then come back here."

"Froakie, return," Serena commanded, returning Froakie to its pokéball.

Calem was about to do the same, but when he held up the pokéball, Fennekin shook her head.

"You want to stay outside?" He asked.

Fennekin nodded. "Fenne."

"Okay then," Calem said. He held out his right arm for Fennekin to climb onto his shoulder.

As Calem and Serena were about to leave, Shauna stopped them. "Calem," she began. "Can we have a pokémon battle?"

Calem shrugged, or as much as he could with 92.214 newtons on his shoulder. "Sure."

A minute later, they were on the battlefield behind Aquacorde Town's local pokémon center. Shauna sent out Chespin, as Fennekin leaped off Calem's shoulder and did a somersault in midair.

"Wait a second," Calem said. "I just realized that neither of us know what moves our pokémon have."

Both trainers quickly scanned their pokémon with their pokédexes.

Fennekin, the fox pokémon. As it walks, it chews on twigs to gain energy. It intimidates opponents by puffing air of 390°F out of its ears. This fennekin is female. Active Ability: Blaze. Hidden Ability: Magician (locked). Known Moves: Tail Whip, Scratch, Ember. Egg Move: Hypnosis (locked).

Calem's pokédex read.

Calem considered this and the somersault, and then said, "Shauna, you can have the first move."

"Why thank you Calem," Shauna replied before yelling, "Tackle!"

Chespin charged. Deciding to take advantage of Fennekin's agility and natural speed, Calem simply waited. "Wait for it…"

Chespin got closer.

"Wait for it…"

Chespin was seconds away from impact.

"Somersault over him and use ember, now!"

Fennekin did just that. Calem had timed the jump so that when Fennekin had turned ninety degrees forward, Chespin would be directly in the line of fire. Fennekin shot the tight bundle of flames out of her mouth, and they impacted Chespin right on the head, causing him to tumble and fall face-first into the dirt. Meanwhile, Fennekin landed perfectly on her feet.

"Nice work, Fennekin!" Calem exclaimed.

"Fenne!" Fennekin replied happily.

But Chespin wasn't down yet, and Shauna knew that. "Use vine whip to tie Fennekin's legs together!" She yelled.

Fennekin suddenly not being able to move her legs was certainly a surprise to her. "Fen!?" She squeaked.

"Now, slam her into the ground!" Shauna yelled. Chespin swung Fennekin over his head to get the most momentum before hurling her into the ground.

Fennekin sprang back to her feet, now facing her opponent, angrier than ever at ruining her fur. Chespin was giggling at his opponent's misfortune, which only served to supplement Fennekin's growing anger, evident in the eye twitching. Before anyone else could do anything, Calem yelled, "Ember attack!"

Fennekin used ember. It was super effective, and Chespin fainted.

"Piiiiiin," he moaned.

Shauna sighed. "Chespin, return."

Fennekin jumped back onto Calem's shoulder and began cleaning herself.

Shauna walked over to Calem, smiled, and extended a hand. "Nice battle." She congratulated.

Calem accepted the handshake, "Same to you," he said. "All right, see you guys in a few minutes!" Calem said to Tierno, Trevor, and Shauna, before he and Serena ran back to Vaniville, while Shauna went to heal Chespin.

* * *

As Serena and Calem were walking back to their house, Calem came to a realization. "How's mom going to react to our pokémon?" He asked suddenly.

Serena pondered this for a second before replying. "It's either going to go really well, or really, really bad."

Fennekin's eyes widened at the thought of Calem's mother not liking her and Froakie. "Fennn…" She squealed quietly, as a few thoughts ran through her head. What if Calem's mother threw them out? What if Calem's mother forced them into indentured servitude? What if…

She began hyperventilating, causing the air around her to steadily warm up.

This caught Calem's attention, as he didn't want to catch on fire and have half his face burnt off. "Fennekin," he said, "calm down. The chances of mom not liking you and Froakie are very, very small. She loves pokémon."

This calmed the fox pup down enough for her heart rate and breathing to return to normal, along with the air temperature. "Fenn," she apologized.

Serena smiled. "It's fine, Fennekin," she said. "You were just a bit paranoid about meeting our mom."

Distracted by the conversation, Calem walked right into the door of his house. He quickly took a couple steps back and waited for the door to open as Serena and Fennekin giggled.

After what seemed like an eternity for Fennekin, but it was actually only five seconds, the door finally opened. Their mother's reaction was not the one that Fennekin was expecting.

"Oh, Calem, Serena, you're back already?" Then she saw Fennekin on Calem's shoulder. Her smile and eyes widened. "You got a pokémon!"

Serena smiled. "I got one too, and if we can come in, I'll show you him."

Calem and Serena's mom, realizing that they were still in the doorway, simply said "Oh," and let them inside.

Once inside, Serena let Froakie out of its pokéball and onto the couch. It looked around at the new area curiously. "Froakie," Serena said, "I'd like to introduce you to my mother."

Froakie looked at Serena and Calem's mother, hopped up to her and, in greeting, said, "Fro, Fro Froakie!"

The twins' mother smiled and said, "Hello."

Fennekin, not liking being left out of the introductions, shouted "Fenne!" and leapt off Calem's shoulder, onto the couch.

Their mom chuckled at this. "And of course I can't forget to say hello to you either, Fennekin." Then she looked at her children. "I doubt you only came here to show me your pokémon. What else is there?"

Calem snapped his fingers. "Oh! I nearly forgot! Professor Sycamore sent a letter for you." He took the letter out of his shoulder bag and gave it to his mother.

She looked at the envelope. In large letters in the middle of the envelope, it read:

Grace Proulx

101 Flower Ln,

Vaniville Town, Kalos Region 71140

The return address read:

Professor Augustine Sycamore

Pokémon Laboratory, Southern Boulevard,

Lumiose City, Kalos Region 75116

Opening the envelope, Grace continued on to the actual letter.

Dear Grace,

Saturday, August 3, 2013

Due to your recent move to Vaniville Town, I've decided to help your children feel more acquainted with other people in the town by giving them starter pokémon. I have sent three of my part-time assistants to give Serena and Calem their pokémon, and they should be arriving Monday around at 9:00 AM. From Friday, August 9th to Monday, August 12th, I will be in Santalune City to conduct research, and would like to meet your children in person. I hope to see them there!

Sincerely,

Prof. Augustine Sycamore, PhD.

Grace re-read the letter a couple of times before making her decision.

"So, what does it say?" Calem asked, getting impatient.

Serena rolled her eyes, but Grace just smiled. "The professor wants to meet you two in person," she explained. "He'll be in Santalune on Friday conducting research, so you should probably start packing."

Calem was about to run up to his room when Grace suddenly stated, "Also, I've come to a decision."

This stopped Calem in his tracks. "What?" He asked.

"Due to you getting your starter pokémon, and the fact that you two have wanted to go on a journey for a while now, I've decided to let you go on a journey if you want to," Grace explained.

"Seriously?" Serena asked disbelievingly. Grace nodded. While Serena was calm on the outside, she was cheering on the inside. Yes! It's about time!

Calem, on the other hand, was doing nothing to contain his excitement. "Yes! Finally! Thank you!"

Froakie smiled. He was finally going on a journey! He had wanted to ever since he could understand English and learned what the word 'journey' meant.

However, despite the positive reactions of her friends, Fennekin was thinking of a bunch of worst-case scenarios. What if they were attacked in the woods by a powerful pokémon? What if one of them broke a bone and they couldn't go on? What if…

She quickly stopped herself from thinking about the negatives and forced herself to think about the positives so she did not wind up burning the house down. She would get to explore the region. That is a plus. Thankfully, nobody noticed the slight increase in temperature except for Froakie.

"I'll start packing," Calem quickly muttered, seemingly still in disbelief, before running upstairs, soon followed by Serena.

Packing. The word reminded Fennekin of something, but she couldn't recall what. All she could remember was that Shauna had told her that they had forgotten something while packing, and that Fennekin had started hyperventilating, eventually passing out. The thought was enough for her to begin replicating the event. This time, it didn't go unnoticed by the only human in the room.

Grace looked at the hyperventilating fox pup, walked over to the couch, and sat down next to her. "What's wrong, Fennekin?"

Grace, noticing Fennekin's breathing had calmed down. The fox pup looked at the floor. "Fenn, Fennekin…"

"You don't want to talk about it?" Grace asked warmly.

Fennekin nodded.

"That's fine then. Just don't bottle it up. Okay?"

Fennekin nodded again. Once Grace left, Froakie decide to strike up a conversation with the fox pup.

"Fro, Fro Froakie?"

Fennekin started to fidget with her paws. "Kiiiin," she mumbled.

Froakie sighed. "Kie Froakie."

When Calem and Serena came back downstairs, each carrying a hiking backpack, containing a tent, enough food and water to last until Santalune and other general journeying materials. Their shoulder bags would store their cash, pokédexes, and pokéballs.

Calem walked up to the two pokémon. "All right guys, time to go!" He held out his right arm for Fennekin to climb up onto his shoulder.

Froakie hopped over to Serena, and she returned him to his pokéball. "So," she clarified, "we're going to Aquacorde first to buy more supplies, and then it's off to Santalune?"

"Yep," verified Calem. "So, if we want to get to Santalune Forest by nightfall, we'll have to get going now."

Grace smiled and walked over to her children. "It seems like you two have your journey all planned out."

"We have a plan until we get to Santalune," Serena explained. "but after that, we've got nothing."

"Besides, things rarely work out as planned," Calem stated.

Grace smiled again. "Well, what are you waiting for? Like Calem said, if you want to get to the forest by nightfall, you'll have to get going now." She embraced both of her children and opened the door for them.

"Bye mom!" Calem yelled, rushing out the door.

Serena sighed. "We'll call once we get to Santalune." Then she ran after her brother. "Calem, wait up!"

Grace sighed, then smiled. Some things never change.

* * *

When the twins arrived in Aquacorde, they were immediately greeted by the trio of part-time researchers. "Hey guys!" Shauna shouted, waving at them.

Calem and Serena smiled and strolled over to them.

"So, what's with all the gear?" Tierno asked.

"The professor's going to be in Santalune on Friday, and wants to meet us." Serena explained.

Shauna jumped up. "Oh! So you're here to get supplies, right?"

She had said it so quickly that Calem had to take a few seconds to react. "Err, yeah."

Somehow, Shauna's smile grew even wider. "Then I know the perfect place to shop for some!" Shauna grabbed his wrist and took off.

Calem's eyes went wide and he visibly paled. Not only was he losing the challenge, but he was being forced to go shopping…with an extremely hyper girl. Fennekin hopped off of his shoulder and walked back to the group. Calem looked at Serena, mouthed the word 'help,' and disappeared from view.

Serena was laughing her head off, but soon stopped. "They better be back within the next hour, or we won't be able to get to Santalune Forest by nightfall."

"Oh, Shauna's gone on some shopping sprees before," Trevor said. "And this isn't one of them. They'll be back within the next half-hour."

Meanwhile, Calem was terrified. Being forced to go shopping with a hyperactive teenage girl was not on his to-do list for today. Of course, neither was getting a starter pokémon, nor going on a journey, although it was him who said that things rarely work out as planned. But the point was, he was not in the mood to overspend. He only had a couple thousand pokédollars on him, after all. So when they entered a regular pokémart, he was understandably surprised. "You know," he said, "I was half-expecting you to drag me into a mall."

Shauna looked at him. "I figured that you wouldn't want to overspend."

"Well, you're correct." Calem said, relieved. "I'll buy the pokéballs. Do you, Trevor, and Tierno have some?"

"Yep. We also have some potions. I'll buy some for you and Serena."

With that, they split up. Calem had bought three pokéballs each for him and Serena, while Shauna bought three potions each for Calem and Serena.

They regrouped outside the store and made it back to their friends fifteen minutes after they had left. "You guys ready to go?" Calem asked, handing Serena her pokéballs and potions as Fennekin hopped back onto his shoulder.

Tierno shouldered his backpack. "Ready as we'll ever be."

Serena smiled. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go!"

With that, the group walked off towards the bridge that would lead them to route two, and a journey began.

* * *

Far off in the Kanto region, the sun was just beginning to set as a teenager walked away from a train station after saying farewell to his friend and companion on his Unova journey. The young man was conversing with a pikachu on his shoulder.

"You know, Pikachu," he said, "I just can't help but feel like something special is going to happen on our next journey."

"Pika, pikachu."

Suddenly, an old man in a car pulled up in front of him. "Ash, great to see you again!" He said in greeting.

The boy, now identified as Ash, smiled. "It's good to see you too, Professor."

"Any idea of where you want to go next?"

"I heard about the Kalos region from a reporter while I was in the Decalore Islands. I think I might go there."

"Ah, Kalos! One of my former students works there!"

"I suppose I'll _meet_ him, then!"

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

 **Pinkie: Hi again!**

 **Me: *sighs* Anyway, this story revolves around Calem, but he will meet up with Ash and co. occasionally.**

 **Pinkie: Also, anyone who can guess what's up with Fennekin being so paranoid all the time gets imaginary cookies.**

 **Me: Yes, so-**

 **Pinkie: Oh Oh! Can I say it?**

 **Me: *sighs again* Fine**

 **Pinkie: Allons-y!**

* * *

 **Author's Notes 2:**

 **Me: So... ah... I'm... back?**

 **Pinkie: Wait you're alive?**

 **Me: Yes. And I've updated this chapter with someone who is actually competent when writing proofreading it, so...**

 **Pinkie: This means to _will_ keep updating, right? Like, chapter five, and stuff.**

 **Me: I think? No promises though. Well, I can say that chapters 1-4 will have this second Author's Notes thing.**

 **Pinkie: You better get a chapter five up at some point...**


	2. Starting Out

**Author's Notes:**

 **Me: ...H-Happy New Year?**

 **Pinkie: *grabs chainsaw* You better have an explanation.**

 **Me: *screams like a little girl and runs away* Update schedules don't work for me!**

* * *

 _Chapter II: Starting Out_

The sun had fully set and twilight had begun when the old man, Ash, and Pikachu arrived in Pallet Town. The car dropped Ash and his pokémon off at a house. "See you tomorrow, Professor Oak!"

Oak smiled. "I look forward to it. Now, you should probably get some rest. Jet lag will kick in soon."

Ash smiled before turning around and entering his house. Greeting his mother, he went upstairs. As he did, he noticed a picture of himself, Gary, a boy and a girl, who all looked to be around eight. He sighed at the memories it brought back. The picture was taken at the end of Professor Oak's pokémon summer camp, back before he and Gary had become such fierce rivals, and before Serena and Calem had moved to Kalos. What he had told the professor wasn't a complete lie. Him hearing about Kalos did spur his memory, but he did not just want to go there because he had remembered it. He really just wanted to see his friends again.

A voice in his subconscious was telling him that there was another motive for wanting to go to Kalos. Serena especially. Since you still have a crush on her.

Ash's eyes widened at the thought. Shut up.

Oh come on, you have to cut the dense act eventually.

I said shut up. Ash responded, this time a bit more fiercely.

You're aura is spiking again. You haven't used it since, what, Hoenn?

Who?

I'm you, but also not you, if that makes any sense. I'm your other side. If you get really mad, and I meant like REALLY vehement, at someone, I come out and mess 'em up. You should start practicing your aura.

But-

No buts! It's not good for you to deny your aura! I don't care if you want to be like everyone else! If you don't learn to control it, it will get out of hand!

I'm arguing with myself…

Go to bed. You should be able to make sense of it in the morning.

Ash didn't respond, rather he just continued his journey up the stairs. Once there, he quickly changed into his pajamas and crashed on the bed. Pikachu just looked confused.

* * *

Back in Kalos, the quintet of trainers were making their way along route two, all of whom were itching for a battle. Well, all except for Trevor, who was just taking pictures.

"Come on!" Tierno whined. "I just want a battle so I can dance!"

"Ugh! Tierno, your yelling is just scaring all the wild pokémon away!" Trevor complained. "I can't get any good shots!"

Suddenly, a wild fletchling appeared! Trevor snapped a quick photo of it before Tierno yelled, "I'm going to catch it! Corphish go!" as he threw a pokéball, causing Corphish to materialize and stand on the field.

"Cooorrrrr phish!" It yelled.

Fletchling charged in with a tackle attack. "Fletch!"

"To the left, Corphish!" Tierno shouted, while also dancing his way to the left with his pokémon. Fletchling missed entirely.

It quickly turned around, however, and assaulted Corphish with a quick attack.

"Corphish, use harden and then catch it in a vice grip!"

Fletchling slammed into Corphish, who grunted at the bit of damage he had taken. It did not do as much damage as it could have though, and Corphish followed through with the plan, grabbing Fletchling's legs in one of his claws.

"Fletch!"

"Now, close range bubble!" Tierno shouted.

Using his other claw, Corphish produced a slow stream of bubbles that Fletchling could not avoid.

"Fletch…" She tweeted quietly, before slipping into the realm of unconsciousness.

Tierno beamed, "Pokéball, go!" He threw the red and white sphere at the bird. It absorbed the red and white bird and shook a few times before going still and sparkling, signifying that Fletchling was caught.

Tierno ran over to the pokéball after returning Corphish, picked it up, and grinned. "I caught a fletchling!"

Fennekin, who had been sleeping on Calem's shoulder the whole time, was woken up by this and looked at Tierno annoyed before going back to sleep.

A few hours later, they finally came across the entrance to Santalune Forest. Looking up, the group noticed that the leaves were already turning various shades of red, orange, and yellow, and that it was already nearing evening.

* * *

They reached a small clearing, and Calem asked, "Should we split up to see if we can find any pokémon and meet back up here in," he looked down at his phone, seeing that it said 7:00pm. "An hour?"

"Sounds like a good idea." agreed Serena.

"Fenne!" Fennekin, who had since woken up from her nap, jumped off Calem's shoulder, a smile on her face.

"I could get more pictures!" Trevor suggested to no one in particular.

"You guys go on ahead, I'll stay here and make dinner." Tierno said while he started grabbing cooking supplies.

"Okay!" Calem agreed, before they ran off in different directions.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, Calem's search was proving to be fruitless. He was looking to the right when he bumped into Shauna, literally.

Calem was the first to get up off the ground, and offered a hand to help Shauna up. She was more than glad to take it.

"Sorry about that, by the way." Calem said, embarrassed.

Shauna, back on her feet, quickly brushed herself off. "It's fine. It was partially my fault as well. Actually, come to think of it, we don't really know that much about each other."

"Hmm, no we don't. Want to walk for a bit and talk?"

"Sure!"

Fennekin smirked. I ship it!

* * *

The next forty-five minutes were spent with Shauna and Calem just talking while Fennekin was busy thinking, OTPOTPOTPOTPOTP!

"So, where did you live before moving to Vaniville?" Shauna asked as they were nearing camp.

"Well," Calem began, "I actually lived in Lumiose before moving out to Vaniville, but before I moved to Kalos, I lived in Pallet Town in the Kanto Region."

"Really, Kanto?"

"Yeah, I had a friend there, Ash Ketchum."

"Must have been hard to leave a friend behind."

"Yeah, but it was harder for Serena."

"Oh?"

"Don't tell her I said this, she'll murder me, find a way to resurrect me, and murder me again, but she had, and I think she still has, a HUGE crush on Ash."

Fennekin, who was listening, changed her thoughts to: The OTPs have been doubled!

There was silence between the trio for the next minute or two before they entered camp, right into a heated argument between Trevor and Tierno.

"I still don't understand why you need to take pictures of everything!" Tierno exclaimed.

"Well, I don't have a photographic memory, so having photographs is the next best thing!" Trevor retorted.

Serena just looked at the newcomers with a look that read: 'Please get me out of this mess as soon as possible or I'll wind up gutting these two like fish.'

Shauna sighed and walked in between the two arguing friends. "Break it up, you two."

They both immediately stopped arguing and looked at Shauna. "Oh hey Shauna, you're back." Trevor said, pushing his orange hair out of his face to speak.

"We thought you had gotten lost or something." Tierno said. "We were about to go looking for you two."

"Nope, Calem and I just got to talking and I guess we took a meandering route back to camp." Shauna explained.

Meanwhile, Fennekin had hopped off Calem's shoulder and was engrossed in conversation with the other pokémon of the group while the humans sat down for dinner.

*translation*

"Guys, we need a plan!" Fennekin exclaimed suddenly.

The rest looked confused. "A plan for what?" Froakie asked.

"A plan to get Calem and Shauna together." The fox pup responded excitedly.

Chespin looked at her strangely. "Seriously?"

"Yep." Fennekin simply said.

Fletchling sighed. "You can't rush these things Fennekin. And that's assuming that they like each other."

"I agree with Fletchling on this one," Flabébé, Trevor's first pokémon, inputted.

Fennekin pouted and turned to her fellow starters. "What about you two?"

"I'll observe how Shauna acts around Calem, and I would suggest that you do the same but vice versa, to determine whether or not they are good for each other," Chespin explained.

"I know absolutely nothing about the subject matter and my trainer isn't involved," Froakie explained. "So, I'm indifferent."

"Do Pikachu, Pansage, and Corphish have a say in this matter?" Fletchling asked.

The group of gathered pokémon looked at the aforementioned trio and sweat-dropped. Pikachu, who Trevor had captured in the forest, Pansage, who Serena had captured, and Corphish seemed to be engaged in an eating contest.

Pikachu looked up. "Wha?" He asked with his mouth full. "Dis stu- is good."

The rest of the pokémon fell into fits of laughter, and grabbed food for themselves before those three got to it all.

*translation end*

Tierno had gotten dinner started by the time the pokémon were done conversing, and the fast eaters, Calem and Tierno, had already finished, and with the help of Pikachu, Pansage, and Corphish, began pitching the tents.

Soon enough, all of the trainers had finished and were falling asleep in their tents. Calem looked at Fennekin and spoke somewhat excitedly. "Well Fennekin, the first day of our journey has been completed."

Fennekin, already half asleep, simply purred out, "Fen…" and slipped into the blissful world of sleep, unaware of the joys and dangers that lay ahead for the group.

* * *

As the first rays of sunlight entered Ash's room, he awoke, changed, and sleepily meandered downstairs to where his mom was making breakfast. "Why hello, sleepyhead!" She greeted her only son.

"Hi mom," Ash replied, yawning. "What time is it? I must have slept like a rock."

"It's actually only seven."

"Seriously? I feel like I've slept for days."

Delia giggled at her son's response. "Anyway, these came for you in the mail." She handed him two letters.

Now who could these be from? Ash thought. Cilan maybe? Possibly Brock? He thought back to his traveling companions over the past six or so years. Brock had stuck with him up until the end of his Sinnoh journey, when he left to train for being a pokémon doctor. There was the infrequent letter and occasional phone call between the two, but nothing much. Cilan was his traveling companion throughout his Unova journey, and they just recently parted ways for him to continue his pokémon connoisseur career in Johto. It was unlikely that one of the letters was from him.

He looked down at the first letter.

 _Ash Ketchum_

 _303 Silver St,_

 _Pallet Town, Kanto Region_

He opened it.

 _Hey Ash!_

 _I know it's been a while since we last talked, but I'd like to tell you that I completed training as a traveling pokémon doctor and would like to join you on your next journey, if it's not too much to ask._

 _You're old friend,_

 _Brock_

"So, what does it say?" Delia asked.

"Brock wants to join me on my journey to Kalos!" Ash exclaimed.

"That's great. Wait, you already decided where you're going?"

"Wow, guess I must have been more tired than I thought last night. I actually have wanted to go to Kalos for a while now."

"Really? Huh. Now open the second one, I'm curious to see what it says as well."

Ash looked at the second letter. It didn't have a return address. Huh, weird. Ash thought.

 _Ashton Ketchum_

 _303 Silver St,_

 _Pallet Town, Kanto Region_

Okay, Ash thought, the fact that this guy used my full name is kinda freaking me out. He began to read.

 _Dear Ashton,_

 _First, I'd like to apologize for not speaking to you in person, and, by extension, being a terrible father for you. I had to leave soon after you were born to keep you from danger. If Giovanni had found out that I had a son, then he would have used you and your mother as leverage for me to help him._

 _Secondly, I'd like to say a few things to you. First up, I've been following your progress as a trainer, and I must say that you have a knack for getting yourself in danger. But more importantly from that (okay, maybe not, but it was a nice transition into my next statement), I've noticed that you do much better in leagues when you use your older pokémon. You were in the top sixteen in Kanto, but you were a newbie trainer, so that was to be expected. Top eight in Johto, but that was your second league. Top four in Hoenn, if only for the fact that you were an experienced trainer, but if you had used your older pokémon, you could've and would've done better. Top four again in Sinnoh, but Tobias was an exceptional trainer, enough to win the league and make his way through two of Sinnoh's Elite Four. But in Unova, you dropped to top eight. Why? Most likely because you're pokémon other than Pikachu were all inexperienced and you underestimated the competition. I would suggest that, before you head off to Kalos, you train all of your pokémon for a week to a month and bring some of your older pokémon with you. I expect you to make it to at least the finals in the Kalos league._

 _Finally, you shouldn't suppress your aura. It's a part of who you are and it can be dangerous not only to you, but to those around you if you don't learn to control it._

 _I hope that someday, I'll be able to come out of hiding and see how you and Delia are doing in person._

 _\- Your Father_

Ash was tearing up by the end of the letter, so much that the snarky voice in his head didn't even bother to show up with an I told you so.

Delia looked confused until Ash handed her the letter, at which point, she started tearing up as well.

Pikachu, who had come downstairs and jumped on Ash's shoulder while he was reading the letter, sent a small thundershock at Ash to 'shock' him out of his trance, and pointed at the stove with an annoyed "Pika."

Ash looked over at the stove and said, "Mom, breakfast is burning."

This also shook Delia out of her trance, and she quickly jumped up to snatch the now burned food off the stovetop.

They ate their breakfast in silence before, after downing an entire bottle of ketchup, Pikachu decided to take a look at the first letter that Ash had opened. When he did, his eyes widened in surprise. "Chu Pika! Pikachu!" shouted the pokémon.

Ash looked over at his excited companion. "Yep! Brock's coming with us on our Kalos journey. Though before that, I'm going to have to think up a training regimen for you guys."

Pikachu's expression seemed torn between elated and terrified.

I would recommend two weeks of training before leaving for Kalos, said the voice in Ash's head. The regimen itself is up to you.

I'll call Brock now and tell him that we're going to Kalos in two weeks, but he can come to Pallet Town before then.

Good idea. Never thought I'd say that to you.

Still filled with snark?

Always filled with snark. Always, and you can't change it.

"Alright," Ash said suddenly, clapping his hands together, having finished his breakfast. "I'll head over to Professor Oak's and call Brock, along with thinking of a training regimen for my pokémon."

You're growing well, my young padawan, said the voice in Ash's head.

You're me.

Yes, but I'm not just going to pass up a chance to reference something.

What should I call you? I can't just keep calling you 'the voice in my head.'

Hmm… I would say your full name of Ashton, but that seems a bit cliché.

Seriously?

I know! How about 'Counterpart?'

Simple, but it makes sense. I like it.

Now go. I'll instruct you in your aura training later.

After saying goodbye to his mom, Ash and Pikachu left for the lab. When they arrived, it was just as they expected. Clean, organized, Gary typing away at one of the computers, etc.

"Hey Gary," Ash greeted his old friend-turned-rival-turned-friend.

Gary turned to him. "Sup?"

"Trying to be cool does not work for you."

"Yeah, yeah. So, what brings you here?"

"A couple things: checking on my pokémon, calling Brock, setting up a training regimen for my pokémon, stuff like that."

"You're having a training regimen for your pokémon? Who are you and what have you done with Ash?"

"Ha Ha, my dad sent a letter and suggested I set one up for my pokémon."

"You're dad's still alive? Sorry, that probably sounded extremely insensitive."

"Nah, it's okay. But yes, he is alive, and yes, I do have a training regimen for my pokémon to think up. Also, Brock may be coming to Pallet at some point."

"Really?"

"Yep, I just have to call him."

"Then go on then. I still have to finish this e-mail to the pokémon scientific community."

"See ya around, Gary."

"Same to you."

Ash proceeded to one of the Video Phones Professor Oak had in his lab, and he dialed Brock's number. It rang for a few seconds before the traveling doctor picked up.

"Hi Ash!" Brock said excitedly. "We haven't talked in forever!"

"It's nice to see you too, Brock. I got your letter!" Ash enthused.

"So I'm assuming you have an answer for me?"

"Yep. It'd be great for you to join me on my next journey!"

"Glad to hear it," Brock grinned.

"My next journey's going to be in Kalos, and I'm leaving in two weeks, but you can come to Pallet before then."

"Two weeks seems like a long gap between journeys for you, Ash."

"My dad sent a letter suggesting I stay and train for a bit before heading to Kalos."

"I'll probably head to Pallet in a week or so."

"See you then."

"You as well."

With that, the connection was cut as Brock hung up. Ash turned around and saw the Professor. "Hi Professor Oak!" He said jovially.

Oak smiled. "Hello, Ash. Here to see your pokémon, I presume?"

"Yep."

"I'll go get Bulbasaur to call them, then."

When Ash got outside, he was greeted as he usually would be by his pokémon: a flamethrower to the face from Charizard, trampled by his herd of 30 tauros, and, when he got back up, tackled to the ground by Bayleef. At least the rest of my pokémon have civilized ways to greet me, he thought, getting up. "Yeah, I missed you guys too," he said. "So, since I caught so many pokémon in Unova, I won't need to do introductions, as all of you've already met all of them, correct?" There was a collective nod between all of his pokémon. He released his Unova pokémon that he had on him from their pokéballs. "Alright, I'll be setting up a training regimen for the next two weeks before I head off to Kalos, and I'll be sure to rotate my team so all of you can travel with me at some point."

There was a lot of squealing following that statement, as Ash had never taken all of them on a journey from the beginning of one of them before. "Now, as for the training regimen…" Ash started, which shut all of his pokémon up.

He had sorted out three tiers of strength for his pokémon to spar and train with each other. Now, he loved all of his pokémon equally, but the tiers of strength were just so his pokémon were not injured while training. The top tier was for his strongest and most experienced pokémon, including Charizard, Sceptile, and, of course, Pikachu. The middle tier was for his pokémon who were still strong, but weren't nearing legendary levels of strength, including Glalie, Gible, and Buizel. The bottom tier was for his pokémon who still had much room for improvement and were quite inexperienced, including Snivy, Pignite, and Oshawott.

Ash relayed this information to his pokémon and got them started on training, then walked into the nearby woods to practice his own training.

Alright, said Counterpart. Aura is very similar to life force, so much so that they are actually quite intertwined, in a literal sense. In fact, your soul, life force, and aura are so connected that they can only be separated by a powerful Ghost-Type pokémon or someone with near complete control over one of the three.

I'm following so far, Ash replied.

Good. Now, because of these connections, controlling your aura depends on your health, both physical and mental. You got that?

Yep.

Okay. So, now we can get to training, physically, mentally, and spiritually.

Huh?

Drop and give me twenty while I constantly pester you about your crush on Serena.

I don't have a crush on Serena.

Denial. I know everything about you because I am you. Now, DROP AND GIMME TWENTY!

And so, Ash's aura training began.

Training had been going on for nearly four hours at this point, and Ash was panting and sweating, but, with the help of Counterpart, he had finally managed to create a small aura sphere between his palms. He checked his watch: 11:34.

Alright Counterpart, Ash began. Time for a lunch break?

Yep, and one for your pokémon too.

As Ash began to walk back to his house, he heard a loud squawk behind him. He turned around and saw…

"Pidgeot?" he asked.

The majestic beige bird nodded her head, her feathers rustling.

Ash smiled and embraced his old friend. "Long time no see, buddy."

"Pidgeooo."

"Sorry about not coming back for you. With the excitement of my Johto journey it must have slipped my mind. So, what's the occasion?"

Pidgeot gestured behind her and Ash saw that several of the Pidgeotto and Pidgey from the flock had evolved. Pidgeot then wordlessly tapped an empty pokéball that Ash had on him and went inside, being captured. Then she popped back out.

"You want to come with me again?" Ash asked, stunned.

Pidgeot nodded.

Ash smiled. "Welcome back to the team, Pidgeot."

* * *

Meanwhile, in Kalos, it was around midnight. A sound from outside jolted Fennekin awake. She slowly exited the tent and looked around. Nothing. She was about to walk back into the tent when she heard breathing behind her. She turned around to see an absolutely MASSIVE ursaring staring down at her. She did what any sane creature who was significantly weaker than their opponent would do: run as fast as possible and call for help while doing it.

Dodging trees and rocks, Fennekin ran as fast as she possibly could to get away from the monster chasing her. That was, until she reached a cliff. She turned around and started quivering at the sight of the ursaring bearing down on her. This is it, she thought, this is where I'm going to die.

Just as the ursaring was about to bring its claws down on the fox pup…

* * *

 **Me: Muahahaha! CLIFFY!**

 **Pinkie: *holds up chainsaw* Finish the chapter...**

 **Me: The next chapter will be out either today or tomorrow, though chapters 4, 5 and possibly even 6 will probably be out tomorrow; I have an eight hours in the car tomorrow. Consider it a late Christmas present.**

 **Pinkie: Okay... Also, I could totally beat Deadpool in a Death Battle.**

 **Deadpool: You wanna go?**

 **Pinkie: Sure; we're in the Author's Notes, so it's not like we can actually kill each other.**

 **Me: Both of you! OUT OF THE AUTHORS NOTES! Just go to the actual video; I can't take two super-powerful 4th wall breaking characters!**

 **Deadpool: Nah, we're just gonna stay here.**

 **Me: *looks at wall with the number four on it* Well, that is already cracked so...**

 ***TARDIS breaks through the wall and the Tenth Doctor comes out***

 **Doctor: Allons-y!**

 **Me: OH FOR THE LOVE OF-**

* * *

 **Author's Notes 2:**

 **Alright, so I've finally gotten to updating this and the next few chapters. Sorry guys, but no more having conversations with myself by using characters from different things.**

 **Also no more self-aware Riolu. I took another look at the fanfiction and decided that his self-awareness was not necessary to the plot or characterization.**


	3. Things Get Interesting

**Authors Notes:**

 **Me: He, he he, ummm...**

 ***explosion in the background***

 **Me: Are you two still fighting?**

 **Pinkie and Deadpool: *turn towards me* You have five seconds to run.**

 **Me: *screams like a little girl and runs away***

* * *

Chapter III: Things get Interesting

The ursaring was bearing down on Fennekin, about to bring its claws down for the finishing blow when…

A flashlight swept across the area the fox pup was in. "Fennekin?" Calem called. "Where are you?"

"F-fenne!" Fennekin called back, sounding terrified.

The ursaring had vanished into thin air, but Fennekin was still shaking. Calem walked up to Fennekin and hugged the shivering pokémon. "It's okay Fennekin. Did you see something?"

Fennekin sighed, and the shivering lessened. She nodded. I really wish Shauna didn't forget my meds, she thought.

"Come on, let's get back to camp," Calem said, standing up.

Fennekin nodded again and padded after her trainer.

* * *

*translation*

When the group woke up the next morning, Fennekin decided to tell the other pokémon about last night's incident.

Froakie looked at Fennekin. "What's up Fennekin? You look a bit shaken."

Fennekin sighed. "Another one happened last night."

Chespin cringed. "Let me guess. More vivid than the last?"

Fennekin nodded.

"What was it this time?" Corphish asked.

"An ursaring," Fennekin responded, shuddering, "And the hallucination was, the way my mind saw it, nearly tangible."

"You get hallucinations?" Pikachu asked bluntly. Flabébé's eyes widened and she shook her head at Pikachu in a 'stop talking now' fashion.

The fox pup glared daggers at the mouse pokémon. "Well I can't help it if I have schizophrenia and Shauna forgot my meds!" She shouted, the air around her steadily growing warmer.

"Fennekin, CALM DOWN!" Froakie said sternly.

Well, at least she isn't glaring at me anymore, Pikachu thought when Fennekin switched her burning gaze to Froakie.

"WHY SHOULD I?" shouted the fox pup. "He INSULTED my condition!" The air around her was gaining temperature at a rapidly increasing pace at this point.

Chespin sighed. "I'll go get Calem and Shauna. You guys just try to calm her down."

"Would it help if I said that I'm sorry for asking such a blunt question?" Pikachu asked.

"NO!" Fennekin shouted, shooting an ember attack at Pikachu, only for it to be shot down with a bubble attack from Froakie.

Chespin had returned with Calem and Shauna in tow. "What is going on here?!" Calem asked, finding a terrified Pikachu and a very ticked off Fennekin and Froakie.

"He INSULTED me!" Fennekin yelled, angrily pointing a paw at Pikachu. Of course all the humans could hear was a very angry "Fen fenne, fennekin kin fennekin!"

"You tried to attack him!" Froakie shouted.

Pikachu's cheeks started to spark. "Yeah! And all I did was ask a question!"

Shauna, sensing a fight was about to break out, shouted "Everyone SHUT UP!"

All of the pokémon immediately stopped arguing and turned to the two humans.

"Thank you," Shauna said. "Now, Pikachu, I want you to apologize to Fennekin for doing whatever you did to make her so angry."

"Sorry Fennekin," Pikachu apologized. "I didn't realize that was such a sensitive subject for you."

The fox pup huffed and turned her head, the temperature slowly dropping to normal late summer temperatures. "Fennekin…" Calem said sternly, diverting the attention of said pokémon towards him, "I want you to apologize to Pikachu for nearly attacking him."

Fennekin glared at her trainer, who stared right back with an equally frightening look. Eventually, Calem won out and Fennekin apologized.

"I'm sorry Pikachu," Fennekin said apologetically, turning to the mouse pokémon. "I don't know what came over me."

"Schizophrenia will do that to people and pokémon," Froakie said.

*translation end*

While Calem had no idea what had come over Fennekin to attack Pikachu like that, Shauna had a pretty good one. "Calem," she asked, "can I talk to you and Fennekin later?" I really wish I hadn't forgotten her medication, she thought.

"Sure," Calem agreed.

Fennekin's eyes widened. Oh crap. I'm in BIG trouble, aren't I? Of course, hyperventilation soon ensued, causing the temperature that had finally decreased back to normal to rise again.

Calem knelt down next to Fennekin. "It's okay, Fennekin. She probably just wants to talk about why you overreacted."

The temperature stopped increasing. "Fen…"

"It's okay, Fennekin. Now come on, let's get some breakfast."

* * *

Meanwhile in Kanto, Ash was walking back from Professor Oak's laboratory as the sun was setting after a long day of training. The teenaged trainer was reflecting on the day with Counterpart while Pikachu was passed out on his shoulder.

Let's see, Ash began, I managed to create a small aura sphere.

Yep, Counterpart responded. With my help and teasing about your crush.

I don't-

Stop denying it when you know it's true!

You're insufferable.

Wow, that's a big word for you.

Shut up.

Fine, fine. Let's see, Pidgeot came back.

Yup! Ash looked at one of the pokéballs on his belt. Pidgeot had fit right in with the top tier of pokémon, and was a little wary of Charizard at first, but when she learned that he obeyed Ash now, she was happy to reunite with him, Pikachu, and the rest of his Kanto team, and meet the Non-Kanto team. Also, since it was the first day, nothing truly momentous happened. I also decided on who I'm bringing to Kalos first.

Oh?

Yes. Pikachu obviously, along with Pidgeot, so she can adjust to the team easier, and Sceptile and Snivy, as they have struck up some sort of teacher/student relationship. It may change over the next two weeks, though.

What else has changed, oh, Brock's coming back, Counterpart said.

That'll be fun. Oh! There was also the bombshell that my dad's still alive and has been watching me for the better part of fifteen years.

That'll take a bit to adjust.

I just hope I can meet him eventually.

That'll be interesting.

They had arrived at Ash's house. He went inside to greet his mother and sit down to dinner, anticipating the next week.

* * *

Back in Kalos, the quintet had finished breakfast and they were trekking through the forest. "So," Tierno began, talking to Calem. "Why did you and Shauna disappear earlier? Did anything happen between the two of you?"

Both Calem and Shauna flushed red at this comment, but Calem quickly said, "No, nothing happened. Our pokémon just got into an argument that had the capacity to, and nearly did, turn violent."

Fennekin's ears drooped at this. "Fenne…"

"What happened to start that?" Serena asked.

"From what I could gather," Calem responded, "Pikachu said something to Fennekin that angered her into shooting an ember at him, which brought Froakie into things because he had to shoot it down."

Trevor pondered this for a second. "What could have possibly caused that to happen?"

Everyone looked at Calem, who shrugged. Then everyone looked at Shauna. "Shauna," Serena began. "You've been unusually quiet. Do you know something?"

Shauna nodded. "Calem," she asked. "Did anything strange happen with Fennekin last night?"

"Yes, actually," Calem said. "I woke up in the middle of the night and Fennekin wasn't there, so I went looking for her-"

"And you didn't wake us!?" Serena all but shouted.

Calem cringed. "Not my brightest moment. Anyway, I found her shaking in fear of something near a cliff, managed to calm her down, and went back to sleep."

Shauna nodded. "Makes sense." She started fidgeting with her hands. "You, uh, you see, Fennekin is, um, well, Fennekin's schizophrenic and I sort of, uh, forgot her meds."

Trevor's palm met his face, Tierno groaned, Serena looked confused, and Calem looked pensive.

"Schizophrenic?" Serena asked.

Before Shauna could speak, Calem answered for her. "Schizophrenia is a mental disease that causes vivid hallucinations, paranoia, random bouts of aggression, and slight memory loss, along with a myriad of other symptoms."

Fennekin sighed. This is bad, this is bad, this is very, very not good. He'll probably think much less of me. Or worse, abandon me!

"So, how bad is it?" Serena asked.

"If treated, it barely affects the schizophrenic, but if left untreated, it can drive the schizophrenic to suicide," Shauna explained.

Calem quickly cut in. "But that won't happen to Fennekin." He picked up the fox pup and looked her straight in her eyes. "We'll get you treatment before you can even think of that. And besides, you having schizophrenia doesn't make me think any less of you."

Fennekin was relieved. "Fenne! Fen kin Fennekin!"

Calem smiled, put Fennekin back on his shoulder, and started running. "Come on guys! We're only halfway through the forest! If we want to get to Santalune by lunch, we have to pick up the pace!"

Shauna smiled and ran after him, Serena following soon after. Trevor shouted "Wait up!" before taking off.

Tierno started a fast jog. "How do you guys run so quickly?!" He shouted ahead.

* * *

An hour or so later, Serena, Calem, and Fennekin arrived on Route 3. Calem looked around. "Where are the others?"

Serena pointed behind them, where Shauna ran up, panting. "How…do you…have…so much…stamina?!" She gasped, promptly collapsing.

Serena chuckled. "I guess Calem and I forgot that you three didn't have the same childhood as us."

Calem helped Shauna up, the latter of which had a slight, unnoticeable blush, unless you're a Fennekin who is looking for any shred of evidence to support her ships. "What sort of childhood would involve you gaining that much stamina?" Shauna asked.

"Serena and I hiked a lot back in Pallet Town," Calem explained.

Trevor ran in soon after, followed by Tierno, the former of which said he just needed to catch his breath, but the latter needed to rest for a good five minutes.

"You okay, Tierno?" Asked a concerned Calem. "Sorry about running."

"I'm good," Tierno gasped out, getting up. "But we're walking the rest of the way."

There was a collective nod of agreement.

"Ugh. Fine." Calem said with faux annoyance.

They made it five steps in before a preschooler challenged Calem to a battle. It was a pichu vs Fennekin. The pichu was young and very inexperienced, and Fennekin, though still inexperienced, had a better capacity to dodge and took the pichu down with two ember attacks, while it wasn't able to land a single hit. This, of course, reduced the kid to tears, who scooped up the pichu and ran off.

"Who even gives these kids pokémon!?" Calem continued to rant fifteen minutes after the kid ran off. "I mean, they're what? Five? FOUR?"

"Calem," Shauna said after finishing a battle against a youngster, "Just drop the subject. At least Fennekin got some experience out of the battle."

"Well, true," Calem grumbled. "Actually, come to think of it, Fennekin's my only pokémon. I'll probably head out to Route 22 to see if I can catch anything after we heal our pokémon at the pokémon center in Santalune."

"Mind if I join you?" Shauna asked.

"Nah, you can come along," Calem agreed.

"So anyway," Serena said. "We're nearing Santalune, so we should start planning. Where do you guys want to go for lunch?"

"There was a coffee shop we went to when going to Aquacorde," Trevor suggested.

"I second that," Tierno supported. "That place was good."

"Before we do anything," Shauna began. "We should heal our pokémon and get to the center."

And so, the quintet continued to the Santalune City Pokémon Center. They walked up to the counter. "We'd like you to heal our pokémon please," Calem said to the Nurse behind the counter whose name tag revealed her to be called Joy.

Joy smiled. "I'll just need to take your pokémon for a second." Fennekin hopped off of Calem's shoulder and Joy picked her up. "I'm guessing she doesn't like her pokéball?"

Calem nodded. "This may take a bit longer than normal," Joy explained. The rest of the quintet placed their pokéballs on the tray Nurse Joy brought out, who then took it to a room to heal the pokémon.

The group sat down at one of the tables in the pokémon center. "So," Calem started. "Should we come up with some sort of plan for the near future?"

"Makes sense," Shauna agreed.

"Alright. So, according to the letter he sent, Professor Sycamore will be in Santalune in three days," Calem said. "Shauna and I'll head out to Route 22 after lunch, see if we can catch anything. I'll probably watch a gym battle to figure out the gym leader's stratagems and a way to counter them. I'll train tomorrow and have the gym battle later in the day."

"I may take on the gym challenge as well," Serena chipped in. "I'm not quite sure, though."

"I'm not sure what I want to do," Shauna explained. "So I'll just follow Calem for now."

"I'll just continue photographing the around Santalune. Who knows, maybe I'll find a rare pokémon!" Trevor said excitedly.

"I'm just going to practice dancing," Tierno pitched in.

A wigglytuff walked up to the group carrying a tray with their pokéballs and Fennekin. The group retrieved their pokéballs and Fennekin jumped onto Calem's shoulder.

"All right, let's get some lunch!" Tierno exclaimed.

And so the five went out to get some lunch and split up. Trevor exploring Santalune, Serena going back into the forest to train, Tierno going…somewhere, and Calem, Shauna, and Fennekin heading out to route 22.

They group walked in silence for a while before Shauna decided to speak. "So…" she began. "Are we looking for anything in particular?"

"No," Calem replied. "But I've heard that there are Riolu in the area. It would be interesting to find one."

Little did the two of them know, however clichéd it sounds, they were being watched. By a riolu. In a tree. Don't ask me why, I'm just the auth- ohhhh…

Anyway, as for what the riolu was thinking: This boy, he's…interesting. His aura seems to extend a bit into the future, then…shift? And continue on indefinitely? And the girl's too, but it shifts to something else. I'll continue monitoring them to find out. The riolu then heard rustling below him, and somehow became even more hidden than he already was.

Back on the ground, in front of the two teens, a litleo, a shiny one at that, no matter how improbable that sounds, leapt out of the tall grass.

*translation*

"Rawr. RAWR! Fear me, insignificant mortals!" The litleo shouted.

Fennekin, who had been walking next to Calem, heard this, then promptly fell onto her back and started laughing. Calem just looked confused, and Shauna, well…

"Oh my Arceus, it's so CUTE!" She shouted, running over and hugging it.

"Cute? CUTE?! I am Horripilante! I am so terrifying I scared my own family off!" The newly-named Horripilante replied.

"You just keep telling yourself that," Chespin, who had also been walking, said, to which he earned himself a slap from Fennekin.

"You could have at least a bit more tact than that," The fox pup said in response.

And so, that is how Shauna wound up catching a shiny litleo. The lion cub attacked the tactless spiny nut pokémon, and Shauna took this as a challenge, as did Chespin. Here is how it went:

"Chespin, use tackle!" Shauna yelled. Chespin charged at his opponent, ramming into Horripilante full speed, dealing a great amount of damage. Horripilante, however, ignored it and shot an ember at Chespin.

"E-nope! Not happening," Shauna said. "Chespin, use your vines to get above the ember!" This move, however, was a bit too advanced and, seeing as Chespin was inexperienced, he was unable to pull off the maneuver. Therefore, the ember burned through his vines and proceeded to impact Chespin himself, dealing nearly enough damage to make him faint.

"Hang in there, Chespin!" Shauna shouted to her starter. "We'll have to work on your defense after this! Use vine whip!" Chespin then smacked Horripilante multiple times, causing the lion to become disoriented.

Shauna used this to her advantage. "Go pokéball!" She shouted, throwing the red and white sphere Horripilante's way. The ball struck the pokémon, and it was sucked in. The pokéball shook una vez, dos veces, tres veces, then let out a pleasant 'ding' as the shiny litleo was captured.

"I caught a litleo!" Shauna exclaimed, then let the lion cub out of the pokéball. "Do you want a nickname?" She asked the shiny pokémon.

Horripilante nodded. "Alright," Shauna said. "First, are you male or female?" Horripilante walked over to some loose dirt and traced the Venusian symbol on the ground. Shauna pulled out a list of possible nicknames for female pokémon she had thought of.

"This could take a while," Fennekin said.

*translation end*

Fifteen minutes later, the self-named Horripilante and Shauna still hadn't come up with a name for the litleo.

"Mary?" The cub shook her head. "Cleo?" Again, another no. Shauna thought for a moment, before snapping her fingers. "I think I have something you might like," she said to the lion cub. "Toba."

The shiny thought about it for a bit, then nodded, as if to say that it was an okay substitute for Horripilante.

"Isn't that the name of a super-volcano?" asked Calem. "I mean, it fits, but the name of a volcano that caused a small extinction event?"

Toba nodded. "She likes it," Shauna explained, and they began moving again.

The riolu, still in the tree, was observing them, and stealthily followed.

* * *

"You! I challenge you!" A rookie trainer shouted, pointing at Calem. "Rattata go!"

The purple rodent materialized on the impromptu battlefield. "Tat ratat!"

Fennekin jumped onto the battlefield. "Fen, Fennekin!"

"Rattata, use tackle!" The trainer shouted.

Fennekin used ember. It hurt the purple rodent, but didn't cause it to stop running, and it tackled Fennekin.

"Fennekin, use scratch while it's close!" Calem told his pokémon.

The fox pup scratched at her enemy, then threw in a point-blank ember for good measure. This blasted the two of them apart. Both were damaged, but Rattata seemed worse off, having been hit with two STAB embers and a scratch, while only managing to tackle his opponent.

"Rattata," the trainer ordered. "Use focus energy and quick attack!"

Fennekin had prepared to scratch at Rattata when he came close, but focus energy charged up faster than she was anticipating, and the fox pup was hit with a powered-up quick attack. She howled, and scratched at the rodent with a boosted attack. This made Rattata collapse, unable to battle, but Fennekin wasn't much better off, and hit the ground moments later.

Walking over to the battlefield, Calem attended to his pokémon with a potion. He looked at the other trainer, who was walking over. "Do you have a potion?" Calem asked.

"Yeah," said the other trainer. "I'm Jay, by the way."

"Calem," Calem responded. He stood up after helping Fennekin up, and offered Jay his hand. "Nice battle."

Jay accepted the handshake, and the two went their separate ways.

So that's what a battle is like, the riolu thought.

* * *

As Ash walked back into the living room, he saw his mother reading the newspaper. "Well, that's interesting," She said.

Ash, now curious, asked, "What is it?"

"Apparently, a chain of islands was recently discovered, and the indigenous peoples call it Alola."

"Huh. I though every land area had already been discovered."

"Apparently not. Something else, when people first went to the islands, they brought over some pokémon not found there, and they adapted to a different environment. They even changed their type!"

"Really?"

"Yes! There's an Ice and Fairy-Type Vulpix and Ninetales living in the mountains, and a Dark and Normal-Type Rattata and Raticate that specialize in thievery!"

"Sounds like someplace Gary would want to go to someday."

"Yes, yes it does. Now, what have you been up to today?"

"Training. Also, Pidgeot came back."

"Wait, Pidgeot's back? I'll have to see her. Anyway, you should get to bed."

* * *

Eventually, Calem, Shauna, Fennekin, Chespin, and Toba decided to head back.

"It's a shame I wasn't able to catch anything," Calem said.

"Fe, Fenne." Fennekin agreed.

"Fennekin did learn howl, though," Shauna countered, looking at the bright side of things.

"True," Calem began, but was interrupted by a rustling in the trees. "What was that?"

Suddenly, a riolu jumped down in front of the group.

*translation*

"I am Riolu," Riolu said, "and I wish to challenge one of you trainers to a battle for the option of being captured."

Both Calem and Shauna looked to their pokémon in confusion, and Fennekin walked onto the field. "Sure, I'll battle you," she said.

Riolu nodded, then bowed, and charged in with a quick attack. Fennekin, startled by the speed of which the attack was executed, was unable to dodge, and was hit in the side.

"Was that really a necessary way to start the battle?" Fennekin asked. She turned to him, and spat out an ember, which he dodged, though barely.

"It caught you by surprise, didn't it?" Riolu asked, then used quick attack again, but this time, the shortest distance from point A to point B was right at Fennekin's face.

"Fennekin, use ember, now!" Calem gave the first command all battle.

The fox pup shot an ember right out a Riolu's face. It stung, a lot, but barely slowed him down, and he rammed into Fennekin and switched to bite, chomping down on Fennekin's leg.

"OW!" Fennekin howled, and scratched at Riolu until he let go, and spat an ember out to keep him away. She massaged her bitten limb, glaring at Riolu so fiercely he shivered, but didn't let it stop him.

Riolu used quick attack again, this time aiming for Fennekin's side. She responded by howling again, and using scratch just as he reached her. Riolu had anticipated this, however, and switched to endure.

By the time Fennekin had figured out the flaw in her plan, it was too late, and she hit him with an attack.

Calem, realizing what happened, shouted, "Fennekin, get out of there!"

"Counter," was all that Riolu said. The punch hard enough to send Fennekin flying for a meter or so demonstrated his point well enough. The energy expenditure was too much for Riolu, and he collapsed onto his knees.

Miraculously, Fennekin managed to get up on shaky legs, her bitten one nearly giving out. She shot her trainer a look that basically said, 'What are you waiting for? Throw the pokéball already!'

"Oh, right," Calem said, and grabbed an empty pokéball and threw it at Riolu. The ball shook thrice, and then dinged, signifying a successful capture.

Calem walked over to the ball and let the emanation pokémon out of it. Riolu looked a little woozy at first, but quickly steeled himself. "That was the strangest experience of my life," he said to Fennekin.

She shrugged. "I opted to stay out of mine."

"So," Calem began. "Two questions. First, do you want a nickname?"

Riolu shook his head.

"Okay then that makes this easier. Second question: do you want to stay outside your pokéball?" Calem asked.

This time, Riolu nodded.

"Welcome to the team, Riolu," Calem said, then applied a potion each to him and Fennekin.

Shauna walked over. "That was interesting," she said.

"Yes, yes it was," Calem agreed.

Riolu walked over to Fennekin. "Very nice battle," he said.

"Yes," Fennekin agreed. "But don't think I'm not remembering the fact that you bit me. How do you even know bite?"

"My family tree's a bit messed up," Riolu explained.

"Huh," Fennekin said. "By the way, Calem's going to scan you with his pokédex. Don't be startled."

Riolu, the emanation pokémon. Riolu are generally hard workers, and can discern the emotional and physical shape of others and project their own via the use of Aura. Riolu also tend to have a strong moral code and sense of justice. This riolu is male. Active ability: Steadfast. Hidden ability: Prankster (locked). Known moves: Endure, Quick Attack, Foresight, Counter, and Bite (egg move). Egg moves: Bite (unlocked) and Bullet Punch (locked).

Riolu blinked. "I did not know that I had bullet punch," he stated.

"I didn't know that I had hypnosis until I was scanned, either," Fennekin responded, then gestured toward the opening back to Santalune. "We need to get to a Pokémon Center."

*translation end*

* * *

A quick trip to the Pokémon Center later, and Calem, Shauna, Fennekin, and Riolu were standing outside the Santalune Gym.

"Alright," Calem said. "We spectate and plan today, then train and battle tomorrow. That sound good to you two?"

His two pokémon nodded. "Fenne."

"Lu."

The four of them walked into the gym. "Are you a challenger?" the receptionist asked. "If so, there's already a match going on, so you'll have to wait."

"I'm just here to spectate," Calem explained.

The receptionist led them to the seating area, then went back to her desk. The four took their seats, then looked out at the battle. The Gym Leader, Viola, had a surskit on her side, and the opposing trainer had a pidgey. The floor had also been iced up to the surskit's advantage, as it is the pond skater pokémon.

"Pidgey, use gust!" the trainer shouted.

"Gey, pi-pidgey!" Pidgey exclaimed.

"Dodge it, Surskit!" Viola ordered the pond skater. "Then use ice beam!"

Surskit successfully dodged the gust of wind, then shot a beam of ice-type energy at Pidgey. It connected, causing the tiny bird pokémon to fall and faint.

The challenger returned his pokémon. "Good job, Pidgey," he said. "Froakie, you're up!"

The bubble frog entered the battlefield. "Use quick attack," commanded the trainer. Froakie, having no trouble with the ice, attacked Surskit repeatedly. It appeared that Surskit had already taken some damage from Pidgey, and it fainted.

Viola returned Surskit. "Vivillon, go!"

"Froakie, use bubble!" Shouted the trainer.

"Use light screen, then sleep powder!" Viola responded.

Vivillon blocked the worst of the bubble with light screen then began to spread sleep powder towards Froakie.

"Use quick attack to get out of there!" The challenger shouted.

Viola responded by ordering Vivillon: "Use gust to spread the powder throughout the battlefield!"

Froakie attempted to hold his breath, but eventually succumbed to the powder and fell asleep. "Use struggle bug repeatedly!" Viola shouted. Vivillon did just that, and Froakie fainted.

The trainers returned their pokémon, and shook hands. "It was a good try," Viola said.

"Thanks," the other trainer replied. "I'll be coming back for a rematch."

"I'll be looking forward to it," Viola replied.

Calem, Shauna, and their pokémon exited the building. "So, you're going to train tomorrow?" Shauna asked.

"Yep, and hopefully have the battle as well," Calem responded. "We're planning tonight."

*translation*

"This is so exciting!" Fennekin all but squealed.

"The battle is tomorrow," Riolu reminded her.

"Yeah, but it'll be my first official battle! I can be excited if I want."

"Okay then."

*translation end*

* * *

 **Authors Notes:**

 **Me: So, next chapter will be planning, training, and gym bat-mphhh!**

 **Pinkie Pie: Got you!**

 **Me: *tied up in a corner with duct tape over my mouth* Mphhh! Mmmphhhh! *duct tape pops off* You're luck I like comedy. *duct tape goes back on***

 **Deadpool: Yes, yes we are.**

 **Riolu: Where am I?**

 **Doctor: Allons-y!**

 **Me: Mphhhhhhhhhhhhh!**

* * *

 **Author's Notes 2:**

 **So, updated chapter three with someone actually proofreading!**


	4. The First Gym

**Author's Notes:**

 **Me: Look, I updated in the same month!**

 **Pinkie and Deadpool: My God, the world is coming to an end!**

 **Riolu: Where am I again?**

 **Me: Just a fair warning: some of this chapter is a bit dark; this story is rated T for a reason.**

* * *

Chapter IV: The First Gym

The five trainers had regrouped at the Pokémon Center, and Calem was already discussing plans with his pokémon. "All right," he began, "the first major thing we have to look out for is the iced-up floor. How are we going to get past that?"

He and his pokémon thought for a moment. In fact, Fennekin thought so hard that she subconsciously started cycling warm air through her ears. Enough that Calem and Riolu noticed. "That's it!" Calem suddenly exclaimed. "Fennekin, you can cycle warm air through your ears, right?"

The fox pup nodded, realizing where this was going. "Fen."

"Hot enough to melt ice?" Calem asked.

Fennekin nodded again. "Fen, fennekin fen."

"Great," Calem started. "That's halfway through one problem. Riolu, any ideas as to what you can do to solve the ice problem?"

Riolu thought for a minute, before coming up negative. "Lu, rio."

Calem sighed. "Well, I guess it depends on who she sends out first, as well. If Surskit is out first, then Riolu, you'll be out until the field is iced-up, then Fennekin's out until Surskit faints. If Vivillon's out first, then Fennekin will be out. How far can you shoot an ember?"

Fennekin shook her head as if to say, 'Not far enough.'

"We'll have to work on range, then," Calem determined. "And Riolu doesn't have any ranged attacks, so we'll see if the local pokémart has a hidden power TM."

Riolu nodded. "Riolu, ri lu."

"Well, it seems as if you have all this worked out," Serena said, walking over.

"Yep," Calem replied. "You taking on the gym challenge?"

"I've decided not to," Serena said. "There's this thing called pokémon performing, though, that seems interesting."

"What are you guys talking about?" Shauna asked.

"Apparently there's something called pokémon performing that Serena's interested in," Calem relayed.

"You're interested in performing?" Shauna asked. "It's interested me for a while as well. It's like contests in Hoenn and Sinnoh, but without the battle sections."

"Hmm," Serena said. "I'll look into it."

"Did you guys know that the local gym leader is a photographer?" Trevor spoke up.

"Here we go again," Tierno said exasperatedly. "Always about the photography."

"Photography is a perfectly viable hobby," Trevor retorted. "An art, really."

"So is dancing!"

"Who said anything about dancing?"

"Are these two always like this?" Calem asked Shauna.

"Not always," Shauna replied, "but this could take anywhere from fifteen minutes to an hour."

"Well then, I'm going to bed. You two can continue talking about pokémon performing if you'd like. Night!" Calem said, then got up and went upstairs.

* * *

In mid-afternoon Kanto, Ash got off the phone. "Pika?" Pikachu asked.

"I made some calls," Ash explained. "Squirtle's coming back, along with Primeape."

"Pika, chu pikachu!"

* * *

The next morning, Calem's alarm went off, startling him and his two pokémon awake at the absurd hour of five in the morning. Without even getting up, he picked it up and nearly threw it across the room before remembering that it was his phone. "Which one of you set the alarm this early?" He asked.

Riolu raised his paw.

"Why?" Calem asked.

Riolu rolled his eyes and grabbed Calem's schedule out of his backpack.

5:00 AM: Wake up & get breakfast

5:30 AM: Start training.

The rest was blank. Riolu gave Calem a look that was ignored, and Calem just slammed his head back into the pillow with a groan. Fennekin just went back to sleep, and Riolu rolled his eyes again, and with a push, Calem and his starter fell off the bed.

"OW!"

* * *

Half an hour and one pokémart visit later, Calem and his pokémon trudged out to an open space on Route 22, Riolu practically skipping ahead with Calem and Fennekin sulking along behind the small jackal at being woken up so early.

"Fe, fenne." She yawned.

The pokémart had a Hidden Power TM, but it took the rest of Calem's money to pay for it. Of course, Riolu was extremely happy to be learning a new move. And something else, but he wouldn't tell Fennekin.

*translation*

"Ughhhhhhh!" Fennekin groaned. "It is way too early to be out here! How are you so chipper?"

"I'm learning a new move and…you'll see!" Riolu responded.

"OH COME ON!" Fennekin shouted.

A few minutes later, Riolu said, "We're here!"

"…that's a small cave." Fennekin said blandly.

Riolu grinned. "Mom! Are you in there?" he yelled into the cave.

A lucario poked her head out from behind the cave wall. "Riolu! You had me worried sick- is that a fennekin?"

Fennekin waved sheepishly. "Hi."

Riolu nodded. "She's my teammate now!"

"Wait," the lucario said. "Teammate? But that would imply that you were captured." Then she noticed Calem standing a few feet away. "A HUMAN! Stand back Riolu, I'll-"

"Wait!" Riolu shouted. "He's my trainer now, okay? Just, look at his aura."

Riolu's mother did that, and promptly tripped over nothing from the backlash. "What?" She asked. "How…but…it's a future event! I shouldn't be getting this kind of backlash! Unless…"

"Unless what?" Fennekin asked.

"Riolu," the lucario began, and Fennekin pouted at not being recognized. The lucario sighed. "And Fennekin, something dangerous is going to happen to your trainer at some point in the future. Something big. Very big."

This sent shivers down Riolu's and Fennekin's spines. "So, on that note," Fennekin began. "Should we start training?"

Riolu nodded. "Want to watch?" he asked his mother.

She shrugged, "It'll give me a chance to give you some advice."

* * *

The group had found a clearing, and Calem decided to get started. "Alright, so Riolu, you'll be working on hidden power for most of the time." He took the TM out of his backpack and Riolu walked over. "Apparently, the disc just has to touch your forehead."

Calem touched the TM to Riolu's forehead, and there was a great rush of knowledge for Riolu. "Woah," he said. "How is the type determined?"

"Let's test this out," Calem said, only having heard 'Ri, riolu.' "Use hidden power on that rock," Calem ordered, pointing to the rock in question. A stream of flame came out from a position between the emanation pokémon's paws, though it went nowhere near the rock.

"Well," Riolu began, "I certainly wasn't expecting that."

Riolu's mother blinked. "You can shoot fire now?"

"Huh," Calem said. "We have to work on aim, but the fire-type hidden power will be good in a bug-type gym."

Riolu got right back to trying to control the flame, and Calem moved on to Fennekin's training. "All right, now, we need to get you to consciously increase the air temperature to the point that ice melts."

Fennekin concentrated. The grass promptly caught fire.

"…uhhhh…"

Riolu's mother used rock slide to smother the flames. "I guess I'm on fire patrol then," she said.

Fennekin grinned sheepishly. "Oops…"

"It's okay," said Riolu's mother. "We all make mistakes."

Fennekin tried again. This time, she managed to keep the grass from catching fire. Instead, in increased the air temperature to unbearable levels. Everyone jumped away from the sphere of hot air and waited for it to cool down again. "So," Riolu began. "It appears that Fennekin has two levels of heat emission: natural and maximum."

"Heh heh, ummm…sorry," Fennekin said.

Seeing Fennekin's apologetic look, Calem said, "It's fine, Fennekin. We just need to work on better control."

He turned back to Riolu, "Can I see your hidden power again?"

* * *

Some time had passed. Riolu was able to fire hidden power in a straight line, and was currently working on moving targets. Fennekin had finally figured out how to control how hot the air surrounding her was and direct it in a certain direction. She was currently working on increasing the range and aim of her ember.

Calem batted another baseball towards Riolu. How he got the two sports items, the world may never know. Anyway, Riolu shot a hidden power just in front of where the ball was, and finally managed to hit it.

"YES! That took forever!" Riolu shouted.

"Nice work, Riolu," Calem said. "You can take a break if you want. I'll go work with Fennekin."

Riolu walked over to his mother and sat down. "That was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be."

"Well," Riolu's mother began. "You were using a different energy than you're used to." Fennekin used ember on something explosive in the background. "You know, you and Fennekin both have a lot of power hidden."

"Really?" Riolu asked.

"Yes, actually," the lucario explained. "You just have to unlock it."

"To be honest," Riolu replied, "I'm pretty sure Fennekin is stronger than me."

"I would put you on equal footing, actually," Riolu's mother responded.

"What?"

"You aren't at all behind her."

Another explosion.

"She is extremely powerful, it would seem."

"So are you. Not many lucario can see as far into the future as you did."

"Alright Fennekin," Calem said, interrupting Riolu's and his mother's thoughts. "Let's try this once more, then lunch."

With the promise of food, Fennekin shot the most powerful ember Riolu had ever seen. It went about fifteen meters.

The fox pup blinked. "YES!"

Calem smiled. "Great job guys!" he exclaimed as Riolu ran over, followed by his mother. "Let's get some lunch."

* * *

After lunch, Fennekin and Riolu were both ready to resume training. "Alright," Calem said. "Riolu, you'll be focusing on trying to unlock bullet punch. Fennekin, you'll be seeing if you can unlock hypnosis."

Fennekin looked unsure. "What, exactly, am I supposed to practice on?"

Calem looked confused for a second before realizing what was going on. "Oh! Riolu, would you mind-"

Riolu cut him off by nodding. "I'm fine with it, sir."

Fennekin giggled at this. "You're calling him 'sir' now?"

"Yes," Riolu responded. "I find it amusing."

Riolu's mother smiled at the exchange. My little boy, part of a team…

Calem, oblivious to the whole thing, had come up with an idea. "Riolu, if you stood on one side of the rock you were practicing with earlier, you could try bullet punch while Fennekin is trying hypnosis."

The two pokémon nodded and went over to the rock. "Mom, any tips on how to get steel type energy working?" Riolu asked.

His mother smirked. "Have you ever hear of the phrase 'fists of steel?"

"Why do I have a sudden sense of impending doom?" Riolu asked.

Fennekin chuckled again and went to her side of the rock. She closed her eyes, and started to think. He's tired, and probably wants to go to sleep anyway. Mom said that psychic influences work better if there's a truth to it anyway. He wants to go to sleep…he wants to go to sleep…he wants to go to sleep… You get the gist.

Meanwhile, Riolu's mother was trying to get him to learn bullet punch. "Alright," she said. "From what your father told me, he got bullet punch to work by punching a rock hard and fast."

"That's it?" Riolu asked. "Punch a rock?"

His mother nodded. "And also while thinking of the steel-type."

"Okay," Riolu responded, and got to work punching a rock.

Calem looked on. What to do, what to do? He thought to himself. He pulled out a book. Might as well educate myself on where we're going next.

* * *

Six hours had passed. Riolu, was still punching the now heavily abused rock, though his fists were starting to get a silvery gleam. He was also feeling quite tired by this point. Fennekin was still had her eyes shut, though if you got close to her, you wound up with the almost overwhelming desire to lay down and take a nap, even though most of it was directed at Riolu. Calem had fallen asleep with is book open to a page on Cyllage City. Riolu's mother was keeping watch, just in case.

There was an audible crack as Riolu's now silver-glowing fists punched the rock into powder. Then inertia decided to jump in and his fists continued downward, forming a small crater about a decimeter in diameter.

"Huh," Riolu said. "So that's how it works." He looked up at his friend and teammate, who then took that moment to open her eyes. They're glowing a dark blue. Riolu noted as he slipped into unconsciousness. I liked them when they were amber.

A voice nudged at his already tiring mind. Sleep.

A thud was heard as Riolu hit the ground, lightly snoring. Fennekin blinked, and her eyes returned to normal. Owwwww… she thought, my head hurts. Was he trying to block it or something?

Riolu's mother came over. "I think he might have been subconsciously attempting to block the effect," she said, looking at her son.

"Maybe," Fennekin replied. Then her stomach growled. "I should probably wake Calem up. Can you take care of Riolu?"

The lucario nodded.

"Thanks," Fennekin replied, then went off to wake the sleeping trainer.

Riolu's mother turned to her son, and proceeded to shout at him. "WAKE UP!" she yelled.

Riolu immediately jumped to his feet. "What?"

"Apparently, training's over for the day," the lucario explained. "I'm guessing you're going back to the city?"

"Probably," Riolu responded.

There was silence for a bit before the mother broke it. "You like Fennekin, don't you," she asked.

"Where the heck did that come from?"

"Just my never-ending need to find someone to hook you up with."

"What?"

"Nothing!"

* * *

"Bye Mrs. Riolu's mom!" Fennekin yelled backwards, as she, Riolu, and Calem walked out of the clearing. "It was nice to meet you!"

"It was a pleasure to meet you as well, Fennekin!" Riolu's mother called back. "Make sure you all visit at some point!"

"We will!" Riolu shouted. "Bye Mom!"

"Bye sweetie!" She replied.

As the trio left the clearing, Calem turned to his two pokémon. "The gym's probably closed by now. What do you two say about meeting up with the others and having dinner?"

The two agreed, and they headed back to Santalune.

* * *

Back at the pokémon center, Serena and Shauna were discussing performing. "So, you show off your pokémon in such a way that it makes you and them look good?" Serena asked.

"Yep!" Shauna replied.

"Huh," Serena said, before turning to her two pokémon. "What do you two think?"

They nodded. "I like this idea," Froakie responded.

"I think it'll be fun," Pansage replied.

At that moment, the door opened, and Calem, Fennekin, and Riolu walked through. The former dropped off the pokémon with Nurse Joy to get healed, and sat down with Shauna and his sister. "So," Calem asked, "what have you two been doing today?"

"I've been learning about performing," Serena replied.

"I'm also going into performing," Shauna said, "and I managed to warm Toba up to it and Chespin wants to."

"Good for you," Calem responded. "Hey, do you know where Trevor and Tierno are?"

"No," Shauna replied. "But they were in a pretty heated argument before you got here. So anyway, how was your day?"

"We weren't able to sneak in the gym battle today, but we got some training in," Calem responded. "Riolu can now shoot fire and punch small rocks to dust, and Fennekin can control the air temperature around her and make people fall asleep."

The two girls blinked at that. "They were able to unlock egg moves that quickly?"

"Well," Calem began, "they aren't exactly supper powerful yet."

Serena nodded. "I wouldn't expect them to be."

A voice came over the PA system. "Calem Proulx, your pokémon have been healed."

Calem went over to the front desk and picked up Fennekin and Riolu. When he came back over, Trevor and Tierno had returned, though they weren't talking to each other. Their pokémon, on the other hand, were getting along just fine, and Fennekin and Riolu went over to mingle with them.

"So, what were you two up to today?" asked Froakie.

"Training," answered Riolu.

"So, I'm guessing you two are ready for that gym battle tomorrow?" Pikachu asked.

"Yup," Fennekin replied this time. "Riolu can now shoot fire and I can make pokémon fall asleep with my mind."

"Is it just me," Corphish began. "Or does that seem extremely hard to believe?"

Thud. Corphish fell asleep. Fennekin blinked. "That was…surprisingly easy. His mind was weird, though."

All the other pokémon subconsciously took a step away from Riolu and Fennekin. "So," asked the emanation pokémon. "Anything interesting happen to you guys?"

"Nothing much," Toba said. "I mean, I learned about performing. It's interesting."

"We met the gym leader," Flabébé inputted. "She gave Trevor some tips about photography."

"Owwwww…" Corphish moaned, waking up. "Remind me never to doubt you two again."

Just then, the group decided to go get dinner, and the fifteen of them went over to the buffet area of the pokémon center. Afterwards, Calem and his two pokémon decided to call it an early night, as they had a gym battle the next day.

Calem was quick to fall asleep after collapsing on the bed. Fennekin, after making sure that her trainer was asleep, whispered, "Riolu! You awake?"

The emanation pokémon yawned. "Yes. Is there something wrong?"

"Just a question," Fennekin replied. "I heard some of your thoughts earlier while I was using hypnosis. You…you like my eyes?"

That left Riolu sputtering. "Well…um…err…well…that question came entirely out of left field."

Fennekin rolled her eyes. "Just answer the question."

The jackal-like pokémon sighed. "If it is any consolation, yes. I do think you have beautiful eyes."

The fox pup smiled. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Riolu replied.

The two then drifted off to sleep with Fennekin smiling and Riolu just being confused. Where the bleep did that question come from?

* * *

As the sun rose in the Kanto region, Ash, Counterpart, and Pikachu awoke. Goooooooood morning, Counterpart said. We're sure to get some training done today.

Not now, Ash groaned in response. It's too early for this.

I'm teaching you how to communicate with your pokémon today.

That's nice.

And Primape's coming back today.

"HOLY SH*T!" Ash began before he was cut off by Pikachu.

"LANGUAGE!" Shouted the mouse pokémon.

"ASHTON KETCHUM!" Delia shouted.

"SORRY MOM!"

What? Counterpart asked. It's not like I started this. At least not on purpose. Totally not.

* * *

The group was at Oak's lab, waiting for Primape to arrive. Finally, Anthony showed up with the beige-furred pig monkey behind him. Ash smiled. "It's nice to see you again, Primape."

Primape nodded. "Ash, Pikachu. It's been a while."

The mouse pokémon nodded as well. "Six years is quite a while. How 'bout I introduce you to the others."

"That would be nice," Primape agreed.

* * *

While Primape was being sufficiently traumatized by the sheer number of Ash's pokémon at Oak's lab, Ash himself was being taught how to understand pokémon.

Alright, Counterpart explained, aura is a GREAT way to see how pokémon are feeling, and it just needs to be translated into words.

Just, Ash responded sarcastically.

Actually, it's pretty easy, Counterpart replied. After sufficiently analyzing their aura, you just KNOW what the pokémon is saying. Sort of like how I just KNOW you have a crush on Serena.

Ash mentally sighed. This was all just an elaborate ploy to tease me about my crush, wasn't it?

FINALLY! YOU ADMITTED IT!

Damn it!

* * *

"So, what's new around here?" Primape asked.

Pikachu chuckled. "You'll see. Oh, you'll see."

Charizard landed behind them. "Primape! It's great to see you again."

The pig monkey turned around, then blinked. "That's new." There was a rumbling in the ground. "What is that?"

Ash's 30 tauros ran up. "Greetings, Primape," said the leader of the pack. "We have heard of your great feats of strength, and have come to properly give you an introduction to the ranch of Oak through battle. Ready boys?"

"Hey!" three of them shouted.

The lead one sighed. "And girls?"

"Aye!" They all shouted at once, and Pikachu and Charizard moved out of the way.

The tauros charged. Primape actually managed to knock out around fifteen of the bull pokémon before he was finally overwhelmed, and trampled. The lead one got up. "That was a fine testament to your strength." Then he promptly collapsed.

"Will they be alright?" Primape asked, pushing himself up. "They wanted a fight, but I don't want to permanently injure any of Ash's team."

"The tauros are tough," said a voice from behind Primape. "Not as tough as me, I suppose, but they'll be fine." Primape had to look very far up to see the huge creature's face. "Snorlax, at your service," said the pokémon. "I have heard quite a bit about you."

"You're new," Primape remarked.

Snorlax chuckled. "I'm not the only 'new' pokémon, though compared to some others, I've been on the team for quite some time."

"My definition of 'new' is 'joining after I left.' So, how many new pokémon are there?" Primape asked.

"We'll have to get Bulbasaur to call all of them," Charizard explained.

"He never evolved?" Primape asked as the four walked to the sunning spot that Bulbasaur had claimed for himself.

"He's decided to get as strong as possible as a bulbasaur first, then evolve and repeat for being an ivysaur," Pikachu explained.

"You know I can hear you, right?" Bulbasaur asked, not even looking up from his rock. "I'll call the others. It's nice to see you again after so long, Primape. How's it been?"

"Training, training, and more training," Primape answered. "I've gotten tired of fighting-type only tournaments, and want to compete in an actual pokémon league. What about you?"

"Well," Bulbasaur began, firing the solar beam in the air. "Mostly I've been stuck here at the lab, but Ash has decided that we're training for another week or so before he's taking us to Kalos. We'll all be there at some point. Oh, here they come."

All of Ash's pokémon had showed up behind Primape. From the sheer number of them, he fainted.

* * *

Back in Kalos, Calem, Fennekin, and Riolu were fast asleep. Fennekin, however, was not exactly restful. Let's take a look into her mind, shall we?

* * *

Wh-where am I? asked the fox pup. She was in some sort of black void. Hello? Is anyone there? Then her schizophrenia started to kick in. Am I dead? NO! No, I…I just can't be dead. I don't feel dead. I must be dreaming, then. Can I control it?

Fennekin attempted to exert her small psychic force over what she thought was a dream, though it didn't work. She tried again, and the dream responded, but not in the way she was expecting.

It started off pleasantly enough, with it starting with a small fennekin view, with the edges of Fennekin's vision blurred. As the dream went on, the edges of Fennekin's vision became more and more solid. After the small fennekin, it was another fennekin fighting a venipede. Then a braixen fighting a gogoat, followed by a delphox battling a pikachu.

Then the dream started to take a turn for the worst. A huge weapon firing, a man with bright orange hair pulling out a gun (at the speed the images were starting to fly by, Fennekin couldn't make out his features), and a delphox battling Yveltal, the pokémon of death and destruction. Though it was the last image that scared the fox pup the most. All her friends and family, everyone she ever knew and loved, lying in a pile dead, and a small group of people cackling maniacally, watching as the Kalos Region, and the rest of the world, burned.

This final image was surrounded by a completely solid blood red outline.

While all this had been going on in Fennekin's head, she had been muttering in her sleep. Riolu was a light sleeper anyway, and had heard this with his very sensitive ears, waking him up. He walked over to where the fox pup was, and noticed that she was shaking. Must be a nightmare, Riolu thought, and he gently shook Fennekin in an attempt to wake her up.

When that failed, he tried shaking her harder, to no avail. So, he just decided to whisper sternly: "Fennekin, you're having a nightmare. It's all in your head. Wake up."

That seemed to do the trick, as Fennekin opened her eyes quickly and jumped up, visibly shaken. When she realized that nothing was going on, she settled back down, and looked at Riolu. "Thank you," she said softly, before managing to snuggle up to Riolu.

Riolu, at this point, was extremely embarrassed. "Uhhhh, you're welcome?"

Fennekin was already asleep, and Riolu was stuck. I just hope we wake up before Calem does, the emanation pokémon thought.

* * *

They didn't wake up before Calem did. The trainer smiled, and very stealthily managed to get out of bed without waking the two. He quickly got changed and ran downstairs, where his friends and sister were already eating breakfast. Trevor and Tierno seemed to have made up.

Calem nearly slid in front of the table where they were eating. "Trevor, I need to borrow your camera," Calem said quickly.

Trevor hugged his camera protectively. "Why, exactly, to you want to borrow my camera?"

Calem considered this for a moment, before saying, "Actually, you guys might all want to see this." There was a pause. "And you never know when you might need blackmail opportunities." He quickly ran back upstairs.

Trevor sighed. "Well, we might as well see what all this is about."

And so, the quartet quickly and quietly made their way up the stairs and into the pokémon center room Calem was using. When they went inside, they were greeted by the sight of a fennekin and a riolu cuddling up together. This was immediately met with quiet awwwww's throughout the room, and Trevor snapping a photo.

This wound up waking the two pokémon up, who, upon realizing the position they were in, immediately separated. And fell off the bed.

"Owwwww," Riolu groaned. Then he and Fennekin noticed the five humans in the room, who were currently laughing at the duo's expense. "We shall never speak of this again," the emanation pokémon told Fennekin.

"Agreed," Fennekin said in response.

* * *

Sometime later, Calem and his two pokémon looked up at the gym. "Alright guys," Calem said. "This is what we've been waiting for. You two ready?"

"Hell yeah!" Fennekin replied quickly.

"I am certainly ready as well," Riolu agreed. "Though Fennekin, I wouldn't exactly take you as one to say 'Hell yeah.'"

"This battle was delayed a day. I can and will be excited enough to say 'Hell yeah,'" the fox pup replied flatly.

Calem, oblivious to his pokémon's exchange, assumed their answers were affirmative and strolled into the gym with Fennekin and Riolu following. The receptionist, the same as last time, looked up. "Are you challenging this time?" she asked.

"Yes," Calem replied.

"Name?" the receptionist asked.

"Calem Proulx," responded the trainer.

"Hometown?" asked the receptionist.

"Vaniville Town," Calem replied.

"Alright, you're good to go," said the receptionist. "Challenger's way to the battlefield is that way." She pointed towards a hallway off to the side.

Calem nodded, and set off down the hallway filled with pictures of bug-type pokémon. Calem and his pokémon looked on in awe, though one picture in particular caught their eye. It was a picture of a family of caterpie, metapod, and butterfree with the apparent parents being a regular male butterfree with an orange scarf, and a pink female butterfree.

"I had to travel to Hoenn to get that picture," came a voice from behind Calem and his pokémon. It was the gym leader, Viola. "It seemed like both parents had been trained before, and had been released into the wild to breed."

"How did you know, just out of curiosity?" Calem asked.

"The fact that they weren't skittish at all around me was a large indicator," Viola explained. "I could also tell that they were from Kanto; it's one of the few places in the world that customarily releases butterfree to breed. Did you know that the great butterfree migration is passing over Kalos soon? If you look closely, you might be able to see those two. Are you a challenger?"

"Yes, I'm a challenger," Calem replied affirmatively.

Viola smiled. "Then follow me."

Viola led Calem, Fennekin, and Riolu through the winding corridor to the battlefield. "I keep having to make new additions to my gym when I get new photographs," Viola said. "Eventually I might just add an art gallery to the gym. But anyway, you're here for the badge. How many badges do you already have?"

"This'll be my first gym battle," Calem replied.

"Alrighty then!" Viola said excitedly. "I know what pokémon I'm using, and the ref will explain the rest of the rules."

Finally, they emerged onto the battlefield. Viola took her side on the field, and Calem took his. "This will be a match between Gym Leader Viola of Santalune City and Challenger Calem of Vaniville Town," the ref called out. "Each trainer can use two pokémon in the single battle format, and only the challenger can switch out. Gym Leader Viola, send out your first pokémon!"

Viola sent out Surskit. "I hope you've prepared, Calem!"

"Challenger Calem, send out your first pokémon!" the ref called out.

"Riolu, you're up!" Calem cried in response. "Don't worry Viola, I've prepared."

"Battle begin!" called out the ref.

"Alright Surskit, start things off with a bubble!" Viola ordered.

"Take THIS!" Surskit yelled at Riolu.

"Use quick attack to dodge!" Calem cried out in response. "Then swing back around!"

Riolu easily dodged the bubble, then swung back around and hit Surskit. "Take that," Riolu said.

Surskit was nowhere near fainting, though, and Viola called out, "Use sweet scent followed by your own quick attack!"

"You aren't dodging this one!" Surskit told Riolu while the pond skater was releasing a smell that would reduce Riolu's evasiveness. Once Riolu was rooted in one spot, Surskit went in with quick attack.

"Use bite while it's close!" Calem yelled in response.

Riolu took the quick attack, taking some damage, and chomped down on one of Surskit's legs, causing in to cry out in pain. "OWWWWWWWW!"

"Surskit, knock him off with ice beam, then shoot ice beam at the ceiling!" Viola ordered.

Surskit did manage to knock Riolu off, though the bug and water-type did not dish out too much damage, as Riolu was a fighting-type, and ice beam was an ice-type move. However, then Surskit used ice beam at the ceiling, causing it to ricochet and ice up the floor.

"Riolu, come back," Calem said. "You're not well equipped to deal with this." Riolu returned to the side of the battlefield. "Now, Fennekin, to the battlefield!"

The fox pup jumped onto the field. "Wouldn't Fennekin just have the same problem as Riolu?" Viola asked.

Calem smirked. "Fennekin, heat up the surrounding air!"

The ice in a three-meter radius of Fennekin immediately vaporized as a bubble of extremely hot air formed around the fox pup.

"Surskit, try bubble!" Viola told her pokémon.

As soon as the bubbles hit the bubble of air, they evaporated. "Fennekin, get rid of all the ice!" Fennekin ran around the battlefield, evaporating ice as she went, and eventually entrapped Surskit on her bubble of hot air.

"Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow owwwwwwwwwwwwww!" Surskit wailed in pain. "Do you know how hot this is?"

"Yup," Fennekin said, then howled. "I find it quite comfortable."

"Scratch!" Calem yelled.

Surskit fainted after about five scratches, unable to dodge any due to the intense pain from the heat.

"There," Fennekin said satisfactorily.

Viola returned Surskit. "Vivillon, you're up!"

The butterfly flew out onto the battlefield. "Alright, miss fire-type, you may have taken out Surskit, but-"

"Use ember!" Calem interrupted.

"Woah!" Vivillon shouted as it dodged the ball of flame and quickly had to escape the second one. "I must say, you have impeccable ai-HOLY SH*T!" Vivillon had to dodge a third ball of flame, and this time it nicked her wing.

"Vivillon, use powder!" Viola ordered.

Vivillon used powder in an attempt to prevent Fennekin from using fire-type moves. Unfortunately for the both of them, it exploded when it encountered the ball of hot air, knocking both the fox pup and butterfly back and disrupting Fennekin's concentration enough that the ball of hot air was destabilized. After a gust attack, Fennekin was down for the count.

"I am TRIUMPHANT!" Vivillon shouted.

Calem quickly ran out onto the field to retrieve Fennekin and sent out Riolu.

"Alright, Vivillon, use gust!" Viola shouted.

"Counter that with hidden power!" Calem responded.

The stream of fire disrupted the aerial disturbance and rammed right into Vivillon, causing it to faint. Viola recalled the bug and flying-type with a sigh. Then she walked over to Calem and handed him the bug badge. "Well Calem, you have earned the bug badge with some quite unorthodox strategies."

"Thank you, Viola," Calem responded, taking the bug badge.

Shauna suddenly jumped down from the stands and hugged Calem. "You did great!"

Calem was confused. "When did you get here?"

"About five minutes ago," Tierno responded. "By the way, the professor is coming a bit early. He's arriving today."

"Well, I can't wait to meet him," Calem replied. "Let's go then!"

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

 **Me: See, told you it was dark. Also, I'm going for a Fennekin/Riolu shipping.**

 **Riolu: What?**

 **Me: Nothing!**

 **Deadpool: That fox is messed up in the head.**

 **Pinkie Pie: See you all next time! All-**

 **Me: NO! I SAY IT THIS TIME! Allons-y!**

* * *

 **Author's Notes 2:**

 **And here is the updated version of chapter four!**


	5. To Lumiose City We Go!

**Author's Notes:**

 **Me: So, uh, hi?**

 **Deadpool and Pinkie: ...**

 **Me: I'm back?**

 **Pinkie: You haven't even updated the other chapters yet!**

 **Me: My proofreader's taking a bit of a break. So this was posted in the meantime.**

 **Deadpool: So yeah, you're alive and all. That's good.**

 **Pinkie: And he doesn't own pokémon. Can't forget to mention that!**

* * *

 _Chapter V: To Lumiose City We Go!_

As the five exited the gym, they were in conversation. "So, what's the professor like?" asked Serena.

"He's really smart," Trevor replied, "but he tends to ramble if you get him going on a topic."

"So, just don't talk about science and we'll be fine, right?" Calem asked.

"Yup!" Shauna replied.

"I just hope he brought my meds…" Fennekin said to Riolu.

"Meds?" Riolu asked inquisitively.

"Oh, right," Fennekin began, "I haven't told you yet. I'm schizophrenic."

"Huh?" Riolu responded.

"Hallucinations, short temper, paranoia, etc." Fennekin answered.

Riolu blinked. "Oh. Does this explain the nightmare last night, or..."

"Maybe," Fennekin replied. "But it could have just been a regular nightmare."

While the two pokémon were having their conversation, they had tuned out the human's conversation. "-and that's why we call Calem a flower child," Serena finished. This caused the group to break out into fits of laughter.

"Just because I worked for a florist for five months," Calem mumbled while blushing in embarrassment. "Besides, it was good pay…and Serena has no right to call me a child when I'm technically older than her!"

The sister scoffed. "By nine minutes!"

"Nine minutes is still time! It's 540 seconds!"

"Or 0.15 hours!"

The other three and the pokémon looked on in confusion. "Are they seriously arguing over whether nine minutes is enough to say that one is older than the other?" Trevor asked.

Shauna and Tierno nodded. "To be honest, it sounds like a stupid argument," Tierno said.

"So is the photography versus dancing argument you two keep bringing up," Shauna said.

"What are you talking about!? He takes too many photographs!"

"How many times do I have to explain this!?"

Shauna and the two pokémon sighed. "Oops," Shauna said.

* * *

When the seven entered the pokémon center, four were still in two different arguments, two were chatting in a language incomprehensible to human ears, and one looked like she was ready to kill the other four humans if they didn't shut up.

"One point seven one times ten to the negative nineteenth times the predicted lifespan of the universe!" Serena exclaimed, trying to come up with the smallest possible number for nine minutes.

"Ten to the forty sixth plank times!" Calem retorted.

"Will you two shut up?!" Shauna exclaimed. "My patience is wearing incredibly thin right now!"

Nurse Joy, Fennekin, and Riolu snickered at the group's antics.

"That goes for you two as well!" Shauna shot at Tierno and Trevor.

* * *

A few hours later, all the pokémon were healed up, the arguments had stopped, lunch had been eaten, and the group was waiting for the professor. It turned out they didn't need to wait that long, since the professor showed up within the next five minutes.

Professor Sycamore was a tall and lanky man, with wild black hair and blue eyes. Despite being in Santalune on business, he was wearing the rather casual purple shirt and black jeans under an open lab coat.

Spotting the group, he walked over and sat down at the table with a smile. "Shauna, Tierno, Trevor, it's nice to see you three again."

The three nodded. "It's nice to see you too, professor," Trevor said.

Sycamore turned to the twins. "You two must be Calem and Serena, correct?"

The two smiled, and Serena stuck out her hand for a shake. "It's nice to meet you, Professor Sycamore."

Sycamore accepted the handshake, and said, "You five have been taking good care of your pokémon, I presume? May I see them?"

The five nodded, and called out their pokémon. Fennekin and Riolu jumped up onto the table with the rest of them. Sycamore looked at the ten pokémon carefully, with the five that knew him waving cheerfully. He looked at Corphish first. "Yo professor," the crayfish said excitedly, "wassup?"

The professor chuckled. "It's nice to see you too, Corphish." He looked at Fletchling next. "You look very healthy. I can tell that Tierno has been taking good care of you."

The small bird would have blushed if she could. "Thank you, professor."

Flabébé was the next one to be inspected. "It's nice to see you again, Flabébé. You and your flower are looking good as ever!"

"Thank you, sir," Flabébé responded.

Sycamore moved on to Pikachu. "A pikachu? Not often seen in Santalune forest, but not unlikely. You look healthy too."

"You're damn right I'm healthy!" Pikachu replied, causing the rest of the pokémon to be happy that the professor couldn't understand them.

Froakie hopped up to the professor. "Hello Professor Sycamore! It's nice to see you again!"

Sycamore chuckled at the bubble frog's antics. "Hello to you as well, Froakie. Who's your trainer?" Froakie pointed to Serena. "You've been taking very good care of Froakie, Serena," the professor told her.

The younger twin blushed. "Thank you, sir. Oh! I caught Pansage while in Santalune Forest too!"

The professor took a look at the elemental monkey and smiled. "You look quite healthy as well."

Pansage nodded. "I've gotten quite a lot of Vitamin D. It helps."

Sycamore took a look at Shauna's pokémon next. Chespin was inspected first of the two. "Hello Chespin. Your quills are still sharp, I can see."

"Yessir!" Chespin responded. "I've made sure to keep perfectly healthy."

The next pokémon actually managed to get the professor to look surprised. "A shiny litleo," Sycamore said. "You are incredibly lucky, Shauna."

"Thank you, professor," Shauna replied. "Toba here wound up challenging Chespin to a battle."

"And Chespin was as tactless as f-" Toba said before she was cut off.

"And I'm just going to stop you right there," Chespin responded.

"You were!"

As the conversation between Shauna's two pokémon dissolved into an argument, Sycamore moved on to Calem's pokémon. "Hello Fennekin. How have you been doing?"

"Where are my meds?" Fennekin asked in a deadpan.

Though unable to understand the fox pup, Sycamore seemed to get the gist of what she wanted. He dug through his pocket and handed to bottle of pills to Calem. "She takes one pill with breakfast and one with dinner," the professor explained.

"Thank Arceus," Fennekin sighed. "I was starting to worry that I'd snap and hurt someone."

"Hopefully those nightmares will go away because of them," Riolu said.

Pikachu had overheard the conversation, but for his own safety, decided to not comment.

Sycamore moved on Riolu. "A riolu? Uncommon, but not rare. You look very healthy, as does Fennekin."

"Thank you, sir," Riolu responded.

"Though you do both seem a bit tired," Sycamore said.

Calem smiled. "I'm taking the gym route," he elaborated, and showed the professor his only badge so far. "I should probably get a badge case soon."

Sycamore chuckled again. "Speaking of which, I recently got a batch of the wrong starters."

"Really?" Serena asked. "Why?"

"Apparently, there was a mix-up with the official pokémon league breeding shipping program," the professor replied. "I got a shipment of Kanto starters and Professor Oak got a shipment of Kalos starters."

"Somebody's getting fired," Calem said.

This got a laugh out of everyone at the table. "Yes," Sycamore said, "someone probably is going to get fired. But anyway, Professor Oak and I came to an agreement, and both the Kanto and Kalos leagues agreed to it."

"What's the agreement?" Shauna asked.

Sycamore grinned. "That instead of giving the starters out to trainers just starting out, we decided to give them out to other trainers instead, but still beginning trainers."

Fennekin smiled. "Yay! We might get another teammate!"

"But first, you have to battle all three," Sycamore said suddenly.

Calem looked surprised. "Three v two? That seems a bit unfair."

"They did just hatch a few weeks ago," Sycamore responded.

"Oh, okay then. I'm pretty sure the pokémon center has a training battlefield out back," Calem said.

Sycamore nodded. "Let's go then!"

* * *

On the battlefield there were Calem and Professor Sycamore, with Trevor acting as referee. "This is a three versus two battle with no switching out. Both trainers will send out their pokémon simultaneously."

"Charmander, go!" Professor Sycamore shouted.

"Fennekin, to the battlefield!" Calem yelled.

The fire lizard and fire fox faced each other on the battlefield. "Alright my Kantonian counterpart, be ready to feel the stinging darkness of temporary unconsciousness!" Fennekin taunted.

"When you put it that way," Charmander responded, "it just sounds morbid."

"Shall we begin?" Sycamore asked.

Calem nodded. "Yes, we shall. Fennekin, use howl!"

Fennekin howled to raise her attack. "Charmander, use scratch!" Sycamore commanded.

Charmander charged at his opponent, claws at the ready. "This is what you get for taunting me earlier!"

"Hypnosis," was all that Calem said, and Fennekin's eyes glowed blue as she sent out the unavoidable psychic message to sleep.

Charmander yawned, "Damn…it…" Then he collapsed, asleep.

"Alright Fennekin, use howl and scratch repeatedly!" Calem ordered.

"And this," Fennekin howled, "is what you get for falling for that taunt!"

After a couple scratches, a now noticeably damaged Charmander was jolted awake. "Charmander, ember attack!" Sycamore shouted.

Charmander swung his tail around to make some embers fly off, a couple of which got into Fennekin's eyes. "Argh!" the fox pup yelled, furiously blinking and swiping at her eyes. "Did you have to get it in my eyes? I mean, I like hot things, but it's in my eyes!"

Charmander smirked. "Hah."

"Fennekin!" Calem shouted. "You can still use your sense of hearing, right?"

"Oh, why didn't I think of that?" the temporarily blind Fennekin questioned.

"Probably because of the pain in your ey-oh crap," Charmander realized. With a couple of well-placed scratch attacks, he was down.

Sycamore sighed and recalled Charmander. "Squirtle, you're up!"

Calem sighed at the disadvantageous situation. _It's too bad I can't switch out,_ he thought. _With Fennekin blinded, she won't be able to target Squirtle for a scratch, or hypnosis for that matter._

"Squirtle, use bubble!" Sycamore ordered.

The bubbles started moving towards Fennekin. "On my command, dodge forward and to your left…now!" The fox pup, whose eyes were still closed, did as she was commanded, and effectively dodged the bubble stream. However, Squirtle redirected the bubble, and it followed Fennekin.

"Squirtle, let her get closer, cut off the bubbles!" Sycamore said.

Calem was confused, but shrugged. "Use howl and keep moving forward."

The fox pup continued doing as she was commanded, moving forward while constantly howling. Once she was at scratching distance, Calem shouted, "Scratch, now!"

"Squirtle," Sycamore commanded, "use bubble!"

Calem inwardly cursed. _If Fennekin takes any more bubbles, she's down,_ he thought. "Fennekin, keep using scratch, but open your eyes!"

Fennekin, realizing that this could put them at an advantage, did so. Both attacks hit, though the bubble managed to clear out Fennekin's eyes. Both took massive damage, though Fennekin seemed to take more.

Sycamore took advantage of this situation. "Bubble now! Don't let her recover."

Fennekin, in an act of desperation, fired off a hasty, though adrenaline boosted, hypnosis. The psychic message to sleep even forced the three nearest humans to stumble back a bit, and the others even had to blink a bit of sleepiness out of their eyes.

The bubbles still hit, and knocked Fennekin out, but she caused Squirtle to pass immediately into deep sleep. Once everyone had recovered, Calem quickly ran out and retrieved his starter. Once everyone was back in place, and Riolu on the field, Shauna asked what everyone was thinking. "What was _that_?!"

"I think," Sycamore began, "that Fennekin has a bit more psychic power than we realized."

Calem raised an eyebrow. "And is that a problem?"

"Not exactly," Sycamore explained. "As long as she takes her meds, she should be fine. Seeing as schizophrenia is a mental condition, it would impact her psychic abilities. You see, all Fennekin have psychic abilities to some extent, but to have that much power with a mental disorder…"

"Alright, no need for a lecture," Serena said. "Can you two finish the battle and figure out science stuff later?"

The two battlers nodded. "Riolu, use quick attack," Calem ordered.

Riolu quickly knocked out the tiny turtle, who was still asleep and had taken damage from scratch, by the way. Riolu dusted his paws. "Is that all?"

Sycamore recalled Squirtle and sent out Bulbasaur. Riolu smirked.

"Riolu, use hidden power!" Calem shouted.

Riolu summoned the stream of flame from between his paws before launching it at the plant dinosaur.

"Owww! OW THAT BURNS!" Bulbasaur yelled, with Riolu laughing like the little pyromaniac that he was.

When Riolu finally let up, Bulbasaur was burnt, but not down. "Bulbasaur, use vine whip!" Sycamore shouted.

The plant dinosaur hit Riolu multiple times with his vines, and didn't seem like letting up. "Riolu, use endure!"

Riolu toughed out the vines until Bulbasaur got tired, which turned out to take around five minutes. Once the entire thing was over, both pokémon were injured, though one was somewhat surprised. "SERIOUSLY?!" Bulbasaur shouted.

Riolu smirked. "Counter. It's my solve-all-problems-move."

Needless to say, Bulbasaur went _flying_. Then Riolu collapsed. "Err… I guess Calem wins, then, as Bulbasaur fainted first." Trevor said.

Sycamore sighed, recalling Bulbasaur. "I should have expected something like this to happen." Then he smiled. "Now, once everyone is healed, you can pick one of the starters to go with you on your journey."

"That's great!" Calem exclaimed.

* * *

Four minutes and thirty seconds later, the group of six were sitting in the pokémon center. "So," Tierno began, "professor, do you have any idea on what happened when Fennekin fainted?"

"Well…" began the professor.

"Nope," Calem interjected. "No talking about Fennekin while Fennekin isn't here."

Everyone looked slightly surprised at the sudden interruption, though it was understandable. "Okay, then," said Shauna.

* * *

In the region of Kanto, a sixteen-year-old aura user was currently asleep with a pikachu in the same state on top of him. Several other pokémon surrounded him. Ash had decided to sleep at the ranch due to Counterpart's nagging that he be more in-tune with nature. All was peaceful. Until a ringtone went off, signaling that Ash had a phone call, and startling nearly all the pokémon awake. Surprisingly, Pikachu and Charizard, despite being the closest to the epicenter of the noise, were not awakened by the ringing of the phone. Ash, however, was. And he was not happy about it either.

Ash answered, prepared to launch dozens of profanities at whoever was calling at this absurd hour, but was not expecting the answer. "Hello. This is an automated message from Kanto Airlines. We would like to inform you that your flight to Lumiose City from Viridian City scheduled for Tuesday, August 20 has been pushed forward one week to Tuesday, August 13 due to predicted weather conditions. Thank you for choosing Kanto Airlines."

Ash pretty much dropped the phone and lied back down in the grass with a mental groan. _Well this screws around with my schedule,_ he thought. _It's what, Tuesday? Or is it Wednesday, now?_

 _Wednesday,_ Counterpart answered. _Why are we awake again?_

Ash chose to ignore that. _And I have to get more training done, and I need to tell my mom, and yada yada yada._

 _Y'know what? Just go back to bed,_ Counterpart suggested.

* * *

Back in Kalos, the five pokémon had been healed from the battle, and were back by Calem's side, in the case of Fennekin and Riolu, or in their balls, in the case of the three starters. "Alright," Sycamore said, "first things first. Charmander, Squirtle, or Bulbasaur?" He opened the pokéballs.

"Hmm…" Calem pondered. "I suppose it also depends on how they and Fennekin and Riolu feel." He turned to his two pokémon. "What do you two think?"

Fennekin and Riolu decided to talk to the starters to get to know which one would want to come. "So," Fennekin started, "which ones of you want to come?"

Charmander immediately backed off. "From what happened, I don't really think I like battling. I'm out."

Squirtle shrugged. "Bulbasaur can go. I don't really feel like journeying anyway."

Bulbasaur shrugged, or as much as a quadruped can anyway. "Meh," the plant dinosaur said before walking up and joining the fox pup and small jackal.

Fennekin and Riolu blinked, and looked at each other. "Well," Riolu said, "that was easy."

Calem blinked, before just accepting it. "Welcome to the team, Bulbasaur," he said with a smile.

This dinosaur just shrugged again, walking over to Fennekin and Riolu as Sycamore handed the pokéball to Calem.

"Now," Sycamore started, "onto Fennekin's psychic abilities."

The group nodded. "What exactly _was_ that?" Shauna asked.

"If I had to wager a guess," Sycamore responded, "I would say it was due to the adrenaline, but it was extremely powerful, even accounting for adrenaline."

Fennekin and the other pokémon, who were of course listening as this directly pertained to one of them, turned to each other. "Well, it makes sense," Fennekin said. "After all, Mom was a psychic prodigy. Actually, come to think of it, so was her mom. And Dad."

Riolu blinked. "Uhh…what?"

Fennekin blushed a little bit. "You're not the only one here with a weird family tree. My family just happens to have a penchant for psychic abilities."

"Okay then," Bulbasaur stated, "just…don't attack me please. I'm a grass and poison-type so…yeah…"

"So Fennekin is just really powerful then? Calem asked.

"That's one way to put it," Professor Sycamore responded. There was silence for a moment while everyone pondered this, before the professor cleared his throat, standing up. "Well, I must be getting on with my research here. Calem, Serena, it was a pleasure to meet the both of you. I suspect I'll be seeing you all in Lumiose soon?"

The group nodded. "Probably by Saturday. Route Four is longer than Two and Three, after all," Trevor said.

Sycamore put the other two starters back in their pokéballs, and the pokéballs back in the briefcase he carried them in. "I'll be seeing you all then, then. Have a nice rest of you day." Then he walked out.

The group looked at each other. "So," Serena said, "dinner then?"

"I would think so," Tierno responded. "Are we leaving this evening or tomorrow morning?"

"I, for one, don't want to break something tripping over something I can't see," Calem said, "so I vote tomorrow morning." Everyone laughed, before leaving to get dinner. Calem was about to, before he remembered something. "So, Bulbasaur, do you want a nickname?" he asked.

The plant dinosaur thought for a moment, before shaking his head. "No, I'm fine with just being called Bulbasaur."

Calem couldn't understand the pokémon exactly, but got the message from the head shake. "All right, I just have to scan you with the pokédex."

 **Bulbasaur, the Seed Pokémon. After it is hatched, the seed on its back gives it nourishment. The seed grows with the pokémon. This bulbasaur is male. Active ability: Overgrow. Hidden ability: Chlorophyll (locked). Known moves: Tackle, Growl, and Vine Whip. Egg moves: Giga Drain (locked)**

Calem shut the 'dex. "All right, last question: do you want to stay out of your pokéball?"

Bulbasaur nodded extremely quickly. "You don't see much of the world when you're in that thing!" he shouted.

Of course, all Calem heard was a somewhat angry "Bulba bulb saur bulbasaur!" but he got the picture, and nodded. "Great! Now, let's get something to eat before it's gone!" And then the human and three pokémon made their way into the dining area.

* * *

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the world, a pokémon trainer was waking up. Ash yawned a bit, before looking around, then diving into his head. _Counterpart, you up yet?_

A large yawn echoed around in Ash's head. _Yeah I'm…_ he yawned again. _I'm up. Why are you up so early?_

 _Well, there's the change in plans._

 _What change in…oh…right._

 _Yep, everything's been pushed forward a week. Which means that there's no more slacking off on training, ever. That and I have to tell Brock, Mom, and the Professor._

Ash could almost see Counterpart's smirk. _You know what that means, right?_

 _Not whatever you're thinking of._

 _Why, my dear Ashton, it means that you get to search out your crush sooner!_

 _Shut. Up._

 _Serena and Ash, sittin' in a tree…_

 _Counterpart, I'm warning you, if you don't shut up._

 _There's nothing you could do to me anyway. K-I-S…_

 _Shut._

 _-S…_

 _The._

 _-I-N…_

 _F**K._

 _Wait you can swear?_

 _UP!_

Ash felt like Counterpart would me smirking again if he had a physical form. _Think of it as revenge for waking me up at four thirty._

 _F**k you._

Exiting his mind and ignoring Counterpart's shouts of _VICTORY!_ , Ash instead focused on the pokémon around him, who had started to stir as a response to Ash's awakening. He had figured out how to effectively communicate with is pokémon the day previous, but he was still somewhat surprised when Pikachu spoke.

"I thought I was the one who was supposed to wake you up," the electric mouse muttered groggily.

"You'll probably get that luxury the second day we're in Kalos," Ash responded.

"I still want to shock you."

"Anyway," Ash said, hoping to divert Pikachu's attention somewhere other than whether to shock him or not, "everything's been pushed forward a week because the airlines here suck."

Pikachu shocked him. Charizard, who had also just woken up, shot fire at him.

"Does this mean accelerated training?" Charizard asked, somewhat hopefully.

Ash nodded. "Oh, and Officer Jenny is brining Squirtle back today. Introducing him to all the new pokémon is going to be fun. Oh, and training starts now."

"But it's like four in the morning!" Pikachu complained.

Ash checked the clock on his phone. "Four forty-five, actually. We've already wasted fifteen minutes, now let's wake up the others. Charizard?"

* * *

Needless to say, the other pokémon were not thrilled that Charizard had been the one to wake them all up, but they lined up in their groups nonetheless. Ash started marching back and forth in front of them. "All right," Ash said, "due to the airlines being terrible, we only have a week to get all our training in." There was a uniform groan from all of the gathered pokémon. "Yeah, yeah, but this means we have to get to training at this exact instant! I can't believe I haven't asked this before, but how many of you actually want to evolve?" Half of the pokémon raised a hand…or claw…or vine… Anyway, Ash said, "I want all of you to choose a partner in your group to spar with, and I want all of you to work twice as hard as you have been. We have no room for slacking off here pokémon!"

And so, training began. It took five hours and a meal before something interesting finally happened: Squirtle showing up. Of course, Squirtle's first thoughts on seeing the complete mayhem that was the lab ranch was: _What the hell?_

Pikachu was the first to notice the turtle pokémon. "Hi Squirtle!" he shouted, while dodging an earthquake from a tauros. "How have you been?" Pikachu used iron tail on the tauros closest to him, knocking him out and using him as a springboard to launch into a volt tackle on another.

"What's this?" Squirtle asked.

"Training," Pikachu answered, quickly throwing up a counter-shield and hurling electro balls in all directions. Once the shield fell, Pikachu darted at the nearest tauros with a quick attack. "Wanna join in?"

"You're taking on all thirty tauros at once." Squirtle deadpanned. Then he smiled. "Of course I want to join in!" He then promptly popped into his shell, and launched himself at the nearest tauros with rapid spin, ricocheting into another…then another. It wasn't enough to knock them out, but enough to disorient them enough to miss the yellow rodent running in between them and shooting them with electricity long enough to NOT hit him with an earthquake. Squirtle then used hydro pump to both simultaneously knock out one tauros and propel himself into another using skull bash. After all of this, there was one tauros left standing, and he was promptly knocked out by a combined hydro pump and thunderbolt.

Pikachu dusted off his paws, then turned to Squirtle. "So, how have you been?"

Squirtle shrugged. "I've been good. Firefighting was fun, but the rest of the squad can handle it."

Pikachu was about to respond, before he suddenly ducked. Squirtle turned around, wondering why the electric rodent ducked, and was hit in the face with a pillar of fire, courtesy of Charizard. "Hello Squirtle!"

Squirtle then launched a hydro pump at the flying lizard, which said lizard easily dodged by simply flying upward. And so Squirtle was introduced to all of Ash's pokémon, and nothing else interesting happened that day other than more training. Back to Kalos!

* * *

Despite taking her meds at dinner, Fennekin was still locked in a nightmare. Said nightmare had dumped her in the middle of what appeared to have once been a nice town. The part that made it a nightmare? It was on fire. _All_ of it. Normally, this would be of no concern to a fire-type like her, was it not for the giant, unnatural structure in the center of the town, towering over the area. Then, she noticed the bodies. The charred corpses of townsfolk. Fennekin did the only sensible thing in that situation; she ran.

She ran as fast as she could away from the center of town. She tried to ignore the corpses as she ran, and she tried to ignore the pained moans of those still clinging to life. After what seemed to her as an eternity, the endless cackling of the flames and moaning of the dying gave way to silence.

Under normal circumstances, one would think this better, but Fennekin still felt uneasy. She was now in the middle of the woods surrounding the town, and she would have expected some bird pokémon to be flying between trees, or perhaps there to be some rustling in the underbrush. But there was nothing.

Suddenly, a voice from within the forest broke the silence. "You…you won't be able to get away with this!" it shouted. The voice sounded familiar to Fennekin, but she could not for the life of her place it in her dream.

"Au contraire, monsieur Proulx," came a second voice.

A gun clicked.

"Fennekin!"

"I've already succeeded."

"Fennekin, wake up!"

The gun fired.

Fennekin woke with a start, breathing heavily. After a moment, she said, "Thanks."

Riolu shrugged. "No problem. Another nightmare?"

Fennekin nodded. "Do you know what time it is?"

"It's five thirty-seven," said a voice from behind the two.

Fennekin and Riolu whirled around to see Bulbasaur messing around with Calem's phone. "Why are you…" Riolu started to ask, but he was cut off.

"Shhh…" Bulbasaur warned, gesturing with his vines to the sleeping Calem, who rolled over. "I woke up early."

Riolu frowned. "That doesn't explain why you're on our trainer's phone," he whispered.

Bulbasaur shrugged as much as a quadruped could. "I was bored."

"So you stole his phone?" Riolu said inquisitively.

"I did not _steal_ it," Bulbasaur retorted. "I simply _borrowed_ it without asking first. I'm gonna give it back."

Riolu narrowed his eyes. "That still does not excuse…"

"Anyway," Bulbasaur said, cutting Riolu off and completely redirecting the conversation, "you have night terrors?" he asked Fennekin.

Fennekin nodded, somewhat solemnly. "Last night, I thought that it was my schizophrenia, but I took my meds at dinner and boom, another one."

"Can you remember any of either nightmare?" Riolu asked. "There might be a connection."

Fennekin shook her head. "Even if there was, I can't remember either of them besides the fact that they came with sheer, unrelenting terror."

"Wait. Back up. You have schizophrenia?" Bulbasaur asked.

Fennekin's expression changed to a glare that she leveled at the plant dinosaur. "Do _not_ make me shoot fire at you as soon as we're outside."

Bulbasaur backed up. "Sorry, no offense meant. I was just curious as to how severe it is."

"I would prefer," Fennekin said through gritted teeth, "not to talk about it."

"Somewhat of an anger management problem, then," Bulbasaur said to himself. "Possibly hallucinations and paranoia and/or panic attacks…"

The temperature in the room started to rise.

"Bulbasaur," Riolu said, calmly, but with a hint of disapproval in his voice, "I would recommend you stop talking. Now."

"Oh," Bulbasaur said, somewhat sheepishly. "Uh…sorry. I ramble to myself sometimes."

Just then, Calem woke up due to the increase in temperature. "Did someone turn up the thermostat?" he asked to no one in particular. "Wait, that doesn't make any sense, it's August…is that my phone?"

Bulbasaur panickedly shot a look at Riolu of _Oh sh*t dude help me out here_. To which Riolu simply responded with a shrug.

Bulbasaur guiltily handed (or vined, depending on whether or not you want to be appendage-specific) the phone back to Calem.

"You were playing Candy Crush?" Calem asked the plant dinosaur in a bit of disbelief.

Bulbasaur laughed nervously and rubbed the back of his head with a vine. "Uh… yes?"

Calem, while not able to understand exactly what Bulbasaur was saying, got the general idea and sighed and pinched his nose. "Just… don't do it again, okay? And Fennekin, you okay?"

Said fox pup had managed to calm herself down, and simply nodded before spinning in a circle and lying down, going back to sleep.

Calem yawned. "I think I'm with Fennekin on this, it's too early to do anything." He laid back down and rolled over. "And whatever you said to upset Fennekin, don't do it again."

Riolu narrowed his eyes. "Yeah, no. You woke up, you'll be getting up."

Bulbasaur, who at this point had laid back down and tried to go back to sleep, cracked an eye open. "Riolu, Fennekin's already asleep and Calem can't understand you. I don't think that you'll be able to do much."

Riolu, without answering, simply walked over to the bed and, rather violently, pulled Calem off of it and onto the floor. Calem, of course, landed on his left arm.

Wincing, Calem picked himself up off the floor and gave Riolu the stink eye. "Was that really necessary?"

Riolu responded simply by shrugging and walking over to wake the fox pup. Fennekin immediately opened both her eyes and tried to use hypnosis. In response, Riolu started pacing to keep himself awake.

After around thirty seconds of this, Bulbasaur asked, "So… are you two just going to keep doing this, or what?"

Riolu narrowed his eyes. "As long as she is insistent on sleeping in, then this will continue."

Fennekin sighed. "It's five forty-five! How is that sleeping in!?"

"We require an early start," Riolu explained. "Therefore, I consider sleeping beyond first waking up sleeping in."

Fennekin gave up trying to get Riolu to fall back asleep, since it obviously wasn't working, and sighed before standing up and walking towards the door. "Fine! Fine. I'm awake."

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, the group was sitting at one of the booths in the pokémon center's dining area. Riolu was happily eating breakfast in the spot next to Calem, but all the others were just too tired to really do anything. Calem was drinking coffee, Fennekin was on top of the table drinking coffee from a bowl, and Bulbasaur was beside Calem drinking coffee from a tiny mug held with his vines.

Hearing footsteps, Calem looked up. It was Shauna, who also appeared to have just woken up, with Chespin perched on her shoulder and Toba walking along beside her, all three looking half-asleep. "Good morning, Shauna." Calem said completely ironically. "You're up early."

Shauna yawned as she slid into the booth across from Calem, Toba hopping up onto the table and Chespin just sort of falling off Shauna's shoulder and going back to sleep. "I could say the same to you," she retorted. "You have any coffee left?"

Calem passed the coffee pot over to Shauna. "So, any reason in particular that has you up this early?"

Shauna yawned again. "I set my alarm, thinking that we would need an early start. Didn't realize no one else would be awake, though." She took a sip of her coffee. "Blegh. You do realize that this is cold now, right?"

Calem shrugged. "There isn't really anything I can do about that. I feel like Fennekin and Toba are at an inherent advantage, though."

The two looked over at the fire types, the former of which had decided to just let the later share the bowl of still obviously hot coffee with her.

"Yep," Shauna agreed. "They definitely have an advantage there. Anyway, why are _you_ up so early?"

Calem gestured to Riolu. "Because this blue thing seems to think that five thirty is a perfectly acceptable time to wake up."

Riolu frowned. "But it is…"

Bulbasaur interrupted him. "Riolu, you are the only being on the planet that thinks that. Five thirty is _not_ a good time to wake up."

"It's fine, Bulbasaur" Riolu retorted. "It's completely fine to wake up this early."

Bulbasaur sighed. "Dude, five of us are drinking coffee and one of us is still asleep. Clearly, this is not an optimal time to wake up."

Riolu shook his head. "Obviously, you are not accustomed to training."

Fennekin sighed and looked down at the two bickering pokémon. "Will you two stop? This argument is annoying and quite frankly, I want breakfast at some point before we leave."

Riolu and Bulbasaur looked at each other before frowning. "This conversation isn't over," Bulbasaur stated.

"Of course." Riolu stated.

Fennekin sighed and looked at Toba.

"Boys, amiright?" Toba asked, both amused and exasperated.

* * *

One hour, thirty minutes, and a meal later, the group of now five humans and three pokémon, as the rest were in pokéballs, exited the pokemon center.

"So, which direction to Route Four, again?" Shauna asked.

"Route Four connects to the northern part of Santalune City," Trevor stated, looking at the map. "We'll be passing through the Route Four gardens for about half a day, and then from there it's a three day walk to Lumiose. We'll be there by Saturday."

"So, what are we planning on doing once we get to Lumiose?" Calem asked.

"Well, I want to stay there at least until Tuesday," Serena inputted. "There's a performance going on then, and I want to watch it."

"Ooh! Can I go with you?" Shauna practically squealed. "I really, _really_ want to see one in person!"

Serena smiled, though somewhat shocked by Shauna's enthusiasm. "Uh… I don't see why not… Calem, do you have enough money for-"

"Ahem. WHAT?" Calem interrupted. "Why would _I_ have to pay for that?"

"Well… you're older," Serena rationalized. "So… you pay."

"You made more money than me!"

"I sold baguettes at a bakery! You sold flowers! Of course I made more money than you!"

"So why don't you pay for it?!"

"Will you two shut up?" Shauna asked, exasperated. "I'll freaking pay for tickets if you stop arguing."

"You don't have to do that," Serena said. "I'll-"

"I'll pay for the tickets, it's fine," Calem suddenly cut his sister off. "Just… don't ask me again. Please."

"Now what I'm looking forward to," Bulbasaur mentioned despite knowing that the five humans could not understand him, "are the flowers."

"Wait, why?" Fennekin asked.

"I literally have a flower growing out of my back," Bulbasaur deadpanned. "Why do you think?"

Fennekin opened her mouth, closed it, and after a bit, responded, "Touché."

"Besides," Bulbasaur said, "botany is just plain interesting. Did you know that photosynthesis is the opposite of a combustion reaction?"

Fennekin opened her mouth, either to make a retort or to spit a glob of fire at her teammate, but Riolu held up a paw. "Hold on, I've got this," he said. He cleared his throat before shouting, "NEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERD!"

Bulbasaur absentmindedly picked a rose from the flowers the group were passing. "The reason I know so much about botany is because us bulbasaur are instinctively born with the knowledge. We kinda need it, since the whole being half plant thing happens." He tossed the rose in Riolu's direction, thorns first. "That's more than you can say."

Riolu swatted the flower away, taking care to not touch any of the thorns. "Well, us riolu are born with instinctive knowledge of martial arts. That's more than _you_ can say."

"Ahem," Fennekin cleared her throat. "Boys, boys. I can shoot fire."

"I can too…" Riolu retorted.

"Well, I can make people fall asleep," Fennekin shot back.

"I'll be able to do that soon too," Bulbasaur responded.

Fennekin was silent for a moment. "I'll be able to make things levitate eventually."

Riolu and Bulbasaur pondered that for a bit before responding, in unison, "Touché."

"Besides, I think tha…" Fennekin trailed off as the octad stalled, looking at the massive hedge wall that had appeared in front of the group.

Trevor walked in front of them and turned around at the apparent entrance to the hedge. "These, my friends, are the Gardens of Route Four."

Calem blinked. "The Gardens of Route Four… are in a hedge maze?"

"Not quite," Trevor explained. "It's more of a hedge wall surrounding the gardens."

"Chespin's gonna want to be out for this…" Shauna said, looking up at the rather tall hedge.

Serena nodded. "Pansage as well, I would think."

"Oh!" Trevor exclaimed suddenly. "Flabébé should probably be out too."

A few seconds and three flashes of light later, the three mentioned pokémon were out of their pokéballs and were also staring at the hedge.

"Wait," Calem said, "haven't you three been here before?"

"Nah, dude," Tierno responded. "We took the road around the Gardens."

"Well, what are we waiting for? I have pokémon to photograph!" Trevor exclaimed impatiently before rushing into the garden, camera at the ready. All the grass types ran in next, followed by Shauna shrugging at their enthusiasm and running in after them, Tierno not far behind. Calem and Serena looked at each other, chuckled, and ran in after them with the other three pokémon.

Upon entering the Gardens, the group stopped in their tracks to marvel at the beauty of them. Trevor was, of course, already snapping pictures of just about everything in existence, and for good garden was filled with just about every flower imaginable, from four o'clocks to roses, from daffodils to daisies. There were also trees, a lot of them. Pretty much any tree that could survive in a temperate environment were in the Gardens.

Of course, having that much flora in a single place would attract a lot of fauna, hence the large numbers of pokémon in the area. There were caterpie, burmy, and wormadam in the trees, butterfree flying in the sky, even the odd flabébé and floette were around.

Riolu whistled. "Now _this_ is a garden."

"No kidding," Fennekin responded. "Wait, where's Bulbasaur?"

"I'm right here!" called the plant dinosaur from within one of the groups of flowers. "I AM ONE WITH THE PLANTS!"

"No you're not," Flabébé retorted, entering the flower patch. "I am."

"I have a flower growing out of my back, though."

"But I ride a floating flower."

"Can't you both be one with plants, though?" Riolu asked.

"NO!" They both shouted at the same time.

"There can be only one master of plant life!" Bulbasaur exclaimed.

"And that's me!" Flabébé shouted.

"I'm the grass type here!" Bulbasaur retorted.

"Neither of you are absolute masters of plant life, so shut up and enjoy the large numbers of plants," Fennekin said, though muttering under her breath afterwards, "I just want to get out of here before these idiots make me burn the place down."

* * *

Four hours of rather slow walking through the Gardens later, the group arrived at an area where there was a large circular area with a fountain in the middle that the path split around. There were several benches around the outside of the path, where the group decided to stop and eat lunch.

It was while the group was eating that Fletching started chirping. It wasn't anything loud, but it was upbeat enough to get Corphish to react in the way he does to any music. That being - he started dancing.

Froakie sighed. "Do you have to do this? Like, seriously, why?"

Flabébé shrugged. "Corphish has always liked to dance, and Fletchling likes chirping to a tune, apparently."

Unbeknownst to the group, two sunglass-wearing ralts were watching the dancing crustacean with interest. "Yo sis," asked one, who appeared to be male, "think we can take 'im?"

The female one scoffed. "Of course, bro. Why wouldn't we be able too?"

"Well, why don't we go out there and show 'em the power of the Dancing Twins of the Gardens of Route Four?"

"Genius idea, brother mine."

Corphish was happily dancing along to Fletchling's tweeting when a pair of sunglass wearing ralts backflipped out of the flowers before facing the crustacean.

"Good mornin', mister dancin' Corphish," said the male.

"We, the infamous Dancing Twins of the Gardens of Route Four, challenge you-"

"To a dance battle!" the male one exclaimed, cutting off his sister.

"Bro, I was going to say that," the female whispered.

"Sis, I wanna get to the dancing quicker," the male whispered back.

This was a surprise to Corphish for sure, but a welcome one. "A dance off, you say?" asked Corphish. "Well, I accept. You won't find a better dancer in the whole of Kalos than me! Fletchling, hit it!"

"Uh, Tierno?" Trevor asked after snapping a picture of the two ralts. "What's going on?"

"Shh!" Tierno responded quickly. "It's getting interesting. Those two are dancers for sure."

And then the music began. Granted, it wasn't much, considering that Fletchling was soloing it. It was a simple 4/4 tune, though at a rather fast tempo. Corphish began dancing, which may seem impressive for a crab, but he does have six legs.

The ralts, of course, were able to keep up, considering the rather simple time signature. They hadn't earned their title for nothing.

Corphish frowned slightly at is opponents' proficiency in dancing. "Alright, let's up the difficulty a bit. Do you know how to waltz? Flabébé, get over here."

Flabébé raised an eyebrow. "Dance, with you? You're way too immature."

"You were the one who was just having an argument four hours ago with Bulbasaur over who is the master of plants," Riolu pointed out.

"That's unimportant," Flabébé retorted.

"Besides," Fletchling said, "I wouldn't be able to do a waltz anyway. It requires a separate baseline. You cool with some other thing in 3/4?"

Corphish sighed. "Fine."

Turns out, the ralts could keep up with that too.

"Make it 3/2!" Corphish called out, eyes narrowing.

Both the ralts and Corphish struggled a bit with the suddenly slower tempo, but the pushed on.

"6/8!" Corphish ordered.

When the ralts kept up with that too, the music shifted to 9/8, and the ralts finally tripped up when the music shifted to 7/8. When that happened, Corphish was declared the winner of the dance off, and the ralts looked down in shame.

"Don't be too sad," Corphish said. "I almost lost."

"This is… this is the first time we've ever lost a dance off…" the female ralts said.

"Yo, can we go with you?" asked the male. "To learn from the master."

"Uh, I'd have to ask Tierno first, but… wait I can't talk to him," Corphish realized. "Hold on."

The crustacean scuttled over to Tierno's bag and rolled two of the pokéballs over to the two ralts, which they happily accepted.

Calem blinked. "Did he just…"

"Yes," Tierno responded. "Yes he did. I now have two ralts."

"But… what? There wasn't even a battle!" Calem exclaimed.

"Yes there was," Tierno retorted. "A dance battle."

Calem seemed to have trouble computing that information. "But… what… sunglasses…"

"Welp," Serena said. "You managed to break my brother. Congrats."

They were all shaken out of their stupor by a sudden distressed cry. Immediately the group took of running in the direction of the cry, which happened to be near the exit of the Gardens.

Calem and Serena arrived first, and realized that the cry was from something being attacked by a group of rattata.

"Fennekin, use ember on one of the rattata!" Calem commanded. "Riolu, go in for a bite!"

"Froakie, help out with a quick attack!" Serena called.

Within a matter of seconds, the rattata had been dispersed, and the group could clearly see what they were attacking.

"It's a combee!" Serena exclaimed, rushing forward. Upon seeing the pokémon up close, her eyes widened. "Oh my Arceus she's hurt!"

She knelt down to analyze the damage. The combee seemed to have taken a hit to the wing, and was unable to fly. Serena looked up at her brother who was also running towards the scene. "We need to get her to a pokémon center."

Calem nodded, and, scooping the combee up in her arms, Serena and him ran back towards Santalune, passing the rest of the group, including a panting Tierno, in their sprint.

Turning around, said person just sighed and began jogging backwards. "I might actually lose weight on the way to Lumiose…" he muttered to himself.

* * *

"Nurse Joy!" the twins shouted in unison upon sprinting into the pokémon center.

"You shouldn't be runni-" the nurse was about to respond before being cut off.

"This combee's wing is injured!" Serena practically shouted, presenting the injured pokémon to Nurse Joy.

Joy's look hardened. "I'll get right to work. Wigglytuff! I need a stretcher for a small to mid sized bug type pronto!"

The combee was quickly put onto the stretcher and wheeled into the emergency operating room, the nurse and pink pokémon with it.

* * *

An hour later, the thoroughly exhausted trio of part-time researchers entered the building. Locating their friends, they sat down next to them. "Why'd you guys run so fast?" Tierno asked. "I think I lost a kilogram on that run alone…"

"The cry was from an injured combee," Serena elaborated. "She was attacked by some rattata, and her wing was injured, so we brought her here."

"You two sprinted the entire way here?" Shauna asked.

"There was a pokémon in danger," Calem said. "Of course we sprinted."

There was relative silence for a long while before Trevor spoke. "So, is the combee okay?"

Serena nodded. "She should be, Nurse Joy is taking care of her."

There was silence again, this time remaining unbroken until Nurse Joy exited the operating room half an hour later.

"Your combee should be fine, Miss," the nurse stated. "I would recommend for her to not overextend herself for a few days, but she'll be fine."

"She's not mine, Nurse Joy," Serena explained. "She's wild. I just sorta acted on impulse."

Joy smiled. "You did the right thing. All pokémon deserve to be helped, wild or trained. I would still recommend you capture her though, at least until she's completely healed."

Serena nodded. "May I see her?"

Nurse Joy smiled again. "You may. Come with me."

The nurse led the group down into the operating rooms, opening the first door. "She's in here."

The combee was awake and alert, and immediately looked at the teen entering the room, recognizing her as the one who saved her. "Hi Combee," Serena said.

Combee continued looking at Serena, but said nothing.

"So, Nurse Joy asked me to capture you for a few days, until you're healed. Are you okay with that?" Serene presented a pokéball to Combee.

Combee seemed to consider this for a second, before tapping the pokéball and allowing herself to be captured.

"Well," Tierno deadpanned, "that was easy. So we're leaving tomorrow then?"

* * *

The next few days passed without incident, as Combee slowly healed and Fennekin, thankfully, had no more nightmares as the group traversed Route Four. However, on Saturday night, the fox pup was woken up by a sound from outside the tent. Remembering what happened last time she that happened, though, she was more careful about poking her head out of the tent and looking around.

To her surprise, it was a floette outside of the door of the tent.

"Hello!" it said enthusiastically.

"Uh… who are you?" Fennekin asked.

"I'm a messenger!" the floette exclaimed. "The Guardian sensed a powerful psychic nearby, and it's you!"

Fennekin backed up. "Uh… I'm afraid you must be mistaken. I'm not powerful at all."

The floette giggled. "Just follow me!" And then she drifted off into the woods.

Fennekin hesitated for a moment before running after her. "Wait up! Who's the Guardian?!"

Riolu, ever the light sleeper, woke up at this and, noticing that Fennekin was not in the tent, had a slight moment of panic. Realizing that that would not accomplish anything, he looked outside and, seeing Fennekin walking off into the woods, followed her.

Fennekin, meanwhile, followed the floette to a clearing, where she was taken aback by the sheer number of fairy types in the area.

The fox pup took a step backwards. "Whoa," she whispered.

The clearing was thick with a strange light pink, though translucent, fog. Fennekin could see several fairy type pokémon in the area, and the seemed to be surrounding a strange pink egg-like shape with two antenna protruding from the top of it.

"Mistress!" the floette exclaimed. "I brought the psychic power you told me about!"

The antenna moved, as if analyzing Fennekin. _Yes,_ a female voice said, transmitting the message directly into the minds of those present. _This is the one. Thank you, Floette._

Fennekin backed up. "Uh… who are you? What do you want with me?"

The voice seemed to giggle. _Fear not, dear Fennekin. I simply sensed a large amount of untapped psychic potential. As for who I am… I am a being not from this area. I arrived here quite by accident in a flash of violet and gold after being awoken._

"But… what could you want with _me_? Surely there are more powerful psychics."

The voice almost seemed to smile. _You are very powerful, my dear Fennekin, but you just have to learn to use that power._

"But, why even bring me here?"

 _Well, that would be because-_

"Hey! Let me through!" shouted the newly arrived Riolu, being held back by a granbull.

 _Oh? What's this?_ Asked the voice.

"I'm Fennekin's friend," Riolu explained, fighting past the bulldog pokémon. "Why did you bring her here?"

 _Yes, this will do…_ the voice said, not bothering to answer Riolu's question. _I sense this isn't the last I'll see of you, young ones. Farewell for now._

* * *

The next morning, at the gate to Lumiose City, Serena let the now completely healed Combee out of her pokéball. "Well, Combee," she said. "You're all healed up now. I suppose this is goodbye?"

Combee looked around, flew around for a bit, and then retreated right back into the pokéball.

"Huh," Serena said. "I guess she wants to stay, then."

On the way through the gate, however, all Fennekin could think about was her encounter with the being the previous night.

* * *

"Wait!" Fennekin called as the being started to drift away. "What's your name?!"

 _My name?_ The voice asked. _My, I haven't been asked that in a while. As for what it is…_

The egg-like object unfolded itself, revealing it to be a somewhat humanoid being, with the pink object it was floating in. After a few seconds, she finally introduced itself, saying, "My name is Tapu Lele."

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

 **Me: Oh, btw, Riolu's not gonna be in the A/N anymore.**

 **Pinkie: Aww, I liked having him around.**

 **Me: Anyway, actually, I might even just change how the A/Ns are structured.**

 **Deadpool: But wouldn't that mean...**

 **Me: That you two are gone? Yes, but it also makes things easier on me. Anyway, Allons-y!**


End file.
